Peace

I started drawing to find peace. I needed a place in my mind/spirit to retreat to after losing my mother on July 10, 2012. I was unable to deal with the amount of regret and grief that had so effortlessly overwhelmed me. I wasn't ready, at all, to be "THIS" much of an adult. Drawing kept me from retreating to a space of pain that I may not be able to return from.

There are times when my often precarious financial situation forces me to look at my work as simply a "meal ticket", or rent, or light bill, or whatever. The frustration that mounts when the orders aren't coming fast and furious, but the bills continue to, is inexplicable. It makes you desperate...it makes you resent everyone who clicks LIKE but doesn't purchase...it makes you side-eye all the people who inbox you repeatedly to ask questions you answered in the first email (if only they would read) only to not commit to the order. All of this takes you so far outside of the realm of "CREATION" that each pencil stroke becomes arduous. You have allowed life to suck the fun out of the thing that keeps you going.

When I allow this to happen, I ask myself one question: "Why did you return to drawing?"...my answer always has been, and always will be - PEACE. I reign myself in, I shoo the bills and the worries away...and I pick up my pencil and I return to my peace. It's a funny thing, the moment I do that, the moment I purify myself in the Waters of Lake Minnetonka (I tried to stop myself. Really. No. No, I did not)...the moment I purify my thoughts and get back to the most organic inspiration the work just starts pouring in. I have watched it happen too many times for it to be a coincidence.

Artists - the bills will often exceed the sales. It's okay. I know it doesn't seem that way, but it is. Remember why you started.