When I start to write these articles here on Muddy Colors, I am often stricken with this strange dichotomy of being vulnerable in the sharing of something meaningful to the world and wondering if anyone even reads these anyway. Sometimes, my anxiety is so strong that I just need to post something that will not allow these feelings to bubble up. These types of articles are usually the ones that become the sharing of a few favorite tools or a quick bullet-point of the progression of a recent piece. But most of the time, I feel it’s truly important to really try to push past the feeling I get of worry and lack of worth, anxiety and dread, and share something meaningful, something human and thoughtful. It’s important to me. And it also scares the crap out of me most of the time.

As I was thinking of writing this, I was reminded of how I’ve been told at times that I was brave. In any of those moments I think what in the world must they mean? How am I brave? Do they have any idea that I am fraught with anxiety about so much of what I do or share? And maybe they do. Maybe they truly see me and somehow they see the work I’ve done to push past the fears in order to do or share what I’ve done or shared. Maybe they just think hey this is a human who needs to hear this, and I am grateful for that. But I still do wonder. Sometimes, when I’ve asked about it, the answers are usually that they consider me to be someone who does brave things often, and in that way, that it’s almost expected of me, and in being that, that it’s somehow easier for me than for others who don’t deviate from their comfort zone. And I am here to tell you that that is definitely not the case. But these are not things that can or should be compared anyway.

For example, if I’m being open and honest here, I think that writing these articles isn’t easy. I’m sure it isn’t for any of us who write them, but I can only speak for myself here. I worry about how this or that might sound, I edit things and make choices to leave things, speak truths, share what’s in the shadows, attempt to humbly send out good energy when times seem heavy. Those of us who are showing up to write, to paint or draw, or share our voice in some way, are also experiencing our own things in life and our own feelings about the worldly issues that we all are facing. We hope to spread hope, even if by simply sharing a piece of art and not saying much about it, but that simply because it made us feel better when we made it, that maybe it might also carry the good energy we felt in the making of it to those who may see it.

We want to be thoughtful and caring about what is happening all around us. When there is a tragedy in the news – which there is constantly, we think what on earth am I even doing posting an article about a brush I like or a piece of art I’ve made? We certainly don’t want to seem aloof by doing so, but this is our day to post and we show up here, where it will then be out there for anyone (or no one) to read at any given date for the end of eternity or as long as there will be internet, whichever comes first.

When I was putting my art book together last year, I had several pangs of anxiety, I had other work to do, a course I’m also working on, and I have life things going on. I had to also remember to take breaks and to get enough sleep, to go for walks, to do things that bring me joy. And the work I do and the book certainly bring me joy! But it’s also stressful to think about all the things that are going to be in there…forever! But the compiling of this book showed me something. It showed me the brave human I didn’t know I was. The writing and the imagery in it is open and honest and vulnerable. It also showed me what I could do better, what I still have to learn and grow into. I saw that I could let go more and be even more vulnerable, to keep going and explore what that means, to walk into that space feeling like it’s okay to feel frightened by it all because that’s just a part of being human, and is a big part of what makes us who we are.

By compiling this book, I was having to look through my history in such a way as to have it all facing me like a mirror in stages of life and experiences, and it helped me to meet myself in that way. As a whole being, not as separate snap shots in different moments of time. And I think, really, maybe what’s seen as brave is not the loud roar that society makes us think it might be like to be brave, but simply a continuing to move forward with that understanding of wholeness, and to stand with integrity in that space of knowing. In the acknowledgement that we’re human and humble, unsure at times yet we forge ahead anyway. That’s it. And that’s a lot.