Well my artwork is flourishing again. Yay! It's helped so much to not just distract from the uncertainty and financial pressures but also by filling my day with something meaningful that I genuinely enjoy.
It makes me feel like I've accomplished something where otherwise I'd just feel like I was failing at life.
I also have been learning some spiritual lessons from it as strange as that sounds.
The first piece I did was "The Soul of a Saint". Saints are always represented by flowers in full bloom -usually roses -and this one in particular reminded me of those old "monk", religious books with artwork in them back many hundreds of years ago from Europe.
The lesson learned from this piece was mostly Time. The first drawing of it was completed in 2015 or 2016. It took me this long to even begin coloring it in because originally I wanted to just keep it a sketch. Then I went for it. Then it was about another month before the next chunk of it was completed. It felt weighted and like work and I kept avoiding it. Then as I got more into it the faster the project went. Within days it was done.
Then I went straight into the next piece.
Not sure what lesson I learned from this one other than everything worked out when I mistakenly thought colors would conflict and ruin things and it's pretty amazing to look at. Took me a couple days to draw and color in completely.
The next drawing I learned the most from and was a shift from just depicting flowers and designs as normal. I specifically wanted to do something spiritual in an overt way so I went with an Angel since that image has been popping up lately.
I love the rainbow effect. The only thing that bothered me about it was the top of the gown around the chest was Green. Initially it was intended to be like leaves blossoming into a flower, but then the flower ended up looking more like a fire and the intricate design in the green top was lost.
But it reminded me of the heart chakra and the fact that's that green -another spiritual issue I couldn't understand. Normally heart is affiliated with pink/red, but chakras depict that soul-center with green. Then it dawned on me last night, Green = Healing. Love = Healing. DUH!
This fed into some chakra art I started a couple weeks ago doing graphic computer art instead of drawings. I wanted to show what each chakra represented in terms of Connection to Self + Divinity.
I depicted the heart chakra as green and it ended up looking like a 4-leaf clover representing "Luck" -not just "Love" -and I kind of liked that. That expressing love and connecting to it would bleed into your fortune.
Anyway, then my Grandma called me asking me to do an Eye artwork for her. When I was 14 or 15 years old I created a watercolor image of an eye crying that ended up going to my grandma's friend who is also like a grandma to me. I was able to do that piece because I was doing watercolor at the time and I was very, very depressed and contemplating suicide. The eye isn't subtle and is very sad/depressed -which was the state I was in. But to people not knowing that, the watercolor effect just seems to lend itself well to this crying eye image -and my grandma wants me to do that exact image again.
And I tried to explain to her that I don't do watercolors anymore and haven't for over 10 years now, I don't have watercolor paint, and I've moved on to using mostly sharpie pen right now. But she still wants an eye -and since she likes Native American themed artwork (which is all over her house) I'm going to depict one in the style I've been doing -like the Angel -and create a "Native American Eye".
It features an eagle, sun/moon, horse, feathers, wolves -and I wanted to elude to a dream catcher so the "eye lashes" on the top consist of the spiral designs found in most dream catchers.
Was thinking about this yesterday and thought, "What does this day mean to me personally?" I have some distant relatives currently serving or who recently served in Air Force and in the medical service of those in battle.
But when I try to think about who has been closest to me that's been the most effected by the military it's my grandpa and my friend Andy.
My Grandpa was a stern man. He meant well, but expressed little. He had served in World War 2, was wounded in his leg and got a metal plate put in, and received a purple heart.
It's hard for me to fathom him being in the midst of a war with bombs going off and guns firing all around. It would scare me to death to be in that place -my hair would turn white overnight.
And yet he alongside many brave men fought and returned home to raise a family and carry on.
The other person I know is Andy. I met Andy back in 2011. He's a 50-something year old who's usually pretty funny. But he gave a speech once about his dad who served in the Vietnam War and died. From Andy I learned that the American Flag is sacred to some. It's not just a symbol for a nation -it has come to represent far more. The only thing you're left to cling to when you're father's life has passed.
So I ask myself what is really "sacrificed" by those in the military.
From what I've seem some lose their lives, but others lose themselves. They are lost to a hardened, rigid mindset that has trouble letting go of the past and tapping back into the peace within the soul. They lose sleep over haunting visions of terrors. They lose time genuinely connecting and reconnecting with those around them. They lose mental stability and sense of place.
It's hard for someone who's come to the brink of death knowingly -with the willingness to let go of this life entirely -to return back to civilian life and take up a job in a cubicle. That readjustment has been named as the greatest struggle by many.
So much is given.
And at the end of the day the worst that is taken is what is given to soldiers when they are ordered to kill and forced to take human life that's innocent. To kill a child. To bomb a hospital. To destroy the lives of families because they were told and those making the calls "got it wrong this time..." To place blood and the slaughter of civilians on the hands of those pledging their lives to fight an enemy -not families -is one of the gravest pieces of the soul taken by those who serve.
Wars weren't intended to be that caviler and careless. They can lead to the lives of soldiers and those who serve being taken, buy they can also lead to the lives of the innocent being ripped from this world as well.
So celebrate and honor the honorable. But never defend the deplorable. Treat the flag with respect -whatever it represents to you remember that for some it has become a sacred symbol that represents the lives of loved ones lost.
And if you genuinely seek to support the troops -donate to nonprofits and causes that take them in when they return home and seek to make them whole again. The wounds within are the hardest to heal and they harden souls that were intended to breath freely in this life.
And never support regimes and governments and systems and leaders and advocates and individuals who treat human life -both the lives of soldiers and the civilians of foreign countries - as if they had no value in this life and were entirely expendable without thought or consequence.
If an angel were appearing to you, but physically you couldn't perceive it, how would God get that message to you that it was happened?
Apparently through spiritual images made with that line of sight rather than spiritual sight alone:
by Julie Dillon
It's hard being a Christian sometimes. It's hard being religious/spiritual in general sometimes where the external world is concerned.
But as someone who's Christian you come across these issues no one ever talks about. I don't mean the delusion of being persecuted by a Starbucks cup. I mean other things.
#1 Going to a new church you've never been to before.
How do you know it's no like Westboro Baptist?
How do you know it's not "Though shalt burn!!!" in its rhetoric?
What if you show up there and everyone has torches and pitch forks and you're empty handed?
#2 Christian Groups + Jobs
When someone invites you to a Christian group or you seek out a potential job at Christian non-profit you feel like you want to know ahead of time concerns for Issue#1, but also whether they speak of religion more or live out spirituality more. Or whether there's a balance.
#3 Too Christiany or Not Christiany Enough
I get this one the most actually. Around people who either aren't Christian or "not very Christian", sometimes I seem too Christian. People either look at you like you're a potential bigot/Westboro-goer or they think you're going to try to convert them. Or they just think it's weird your that spiritual or believe in Jesus.
Then there's opposite that happens when you're around devout Christians who start referring to the people who are either atheist, agnostic, not that spiritual, or of a different faith as "Non-Christians" -as if you're only one of 2 options: Christian or Not. And they start talking about them as if they were some sub-human set of people like, "Do you ever hangout with non-Christians?" And immediately I think 2 things:
1. "You mean other human beings? Yah I hangout with them?"
2. "Am I only supposed to hangout with devout Christians?... Yah that's not happening..."
And I feel lost.
#4 Feeling lost
I'm too Christiany for some people,
not Christiany enough for others,
I take other beliefs into consideration outside of Christianity -does that disqualify me?,
I don't know the Bible backwards forwards and upside down but some of the people I've met that do have utterly and completely missed the main points which I seem to understand somehow,
I believe God is vast and complex and amazing and in everything and cannot be confined to a singular book or doctrine,
I know I have been led to understand what I do and one of those understandings is that organized religion is a blessing because of those who bless others with wisdom and compassion and a curse by those who curse others with hatred and inflicted pains,
and I'm too spiritual and too religious and not enough of both.
I just want Peace.
But God also brings me Joy and leads me to Love.
And I come to Understand.
And that's about it.
May 17th was a day set aside for recognizing abuses against LGBT members the world over. And for the first time ever, somebody posted the Bisexual flag and I'd never seen it before -and neither had they:
And as a color-oriented artist, this got me thinking: Why those colors? What does it mean?
And the Asexual flag is:
Especially since I'm A+Bi-Sexual (working my way through the alphabet apparently), I kind of decided to make a flag of my own.
So I started with the color white -which for me is the absence of lust/sexual desire/sexual attraction which represents my asexuality.
Then I went to put the color pink and blue in there to represent my attraction to men and women and decided -that's not really what it is. You're never really straight AND gay -you're always simultaneously both. When you're attracted to a man the ability to be attracted to women doesn't exactly go away and stop existing. It's never men or women -it's always both. It's an attraction to both. So I combined the colors pink/purple and blue and got Indigo -which is neither blue nor purple and Always both. A hybrid.
I then put in symbols for man and woman and the upside down pyramid and spade which are affiliated with asexuality.
Voila:
I don't know why more flags don't incorporate symbols instead of just colors.
Anyways, I feel better having my own flag -I think everyone should feel free to make their own. Even straight people. Your attraction and orientation are unique to you. It's not some generic template, there are inevitably going to be things you;re drawn to that others aren't.
For me, attraction all comes down to soul. I don't care about the packaging, I'm drawn to qualities both men and women carry within them -like caring, honesty, empathy, and divinity.
Thank God I'm organized. I've got 4 pages worth of blog prompts and no desire to write them out.
One day many years from now I'm going to get snowed in randomly for 3 months and feel an over-whelming urge to write day and night until everything is typed up.
I have NEW categories for my blogs. And this in addiction to the other 4 to 5 pages of previous blog prompts I gave up on writing when I started a new blog-idea Word document.
I hate typing my thoughts, it's so much easier to think them, pat myself on the back, and jot down 2 sentences worth of what was just covered in summary.
So to crack down on some of these; I'm just going to write out 7 simpler/shorter thoughts that have accrued in the category now titled "Spiritual: Philosophy".
#1 Thought sin Christ + Mary
This thought occurred to me while waking up one morning about a week ago. It was around Mother's Day, so maybe that's why it came up since it kind of bothered me that Mary is never fully acknowledged on this day as I feel she should be. Praise to Doreen Virtue for stepping in:
Anyway, the thought that occurred to me was: Mary as a soul came from God/Christ and Christ was within Mary physically.
In other words: "Mary was of Christ and Christ was of Mary".
I just thought it was a beautiful and kind of remarkable sort of symmetry.
#2 "Every day is an opportunity for kindness waiting to happen."
Was at the grocery store with my dad and there was a woman behind us with only 2 items and we had a whole cart full. My dad didn't see her but the woman was wandering from aisle to aisle looking for the quickest check-out option. I tapped my dad and said, "We should let her through." My dad's always been polite to strangers so he immediately saw and KNEW. He said, "Of course! Please come in front of us, no problem!"
It's weird to say that moment felt "fated" but it did. It occurred to me: Maybe every day has opportunities for kindness hidden throughout that we're meant to find and breathe life to.
#3 Life about Self v. Life with God
I keep getting led back to the understanding that Greed, Egotistical Selfishness, and Apathy towards others is the deepest, inter-related problem we have to contend with on this planet. It's the root of just about any kind of pain or world issue you can name.
And when people get absorbed with SELF alone they shrink within themselves, their line of sight becomes blinded, and they end up suffering and lashing out at other people. But when people take in God, faith, understanding, patience, and peace they are extended within themselves and beyond themselves. It's the difference between existing in a cubicle verses the great expanse of nature.
Life about self = Soap Opera Drama. Life with God = Amazing
#4 Each Person is Sacred
This thought hit me -not just in concept but I felt and understood it within. That I should look at each person as a lighted soul within. A sacred being. A statue of Christ. A Temple of worship. That the outer and internal negativity people degrade themselves to would not cover the eternal. Especially if people are being mean/uncaring towards you.
#5 Positive, Spiritual Groups
Was drawn again to a spiritual, mostly-women's group. And I though, "WHY do I keep getting drawn to women's groups and spiritual groups? I don't like groups that much..."
And it occurred to me: When I'm in those kinds of groups I receive positive, spiritual influence of others and that contributes to what I'll call spiritual protection and support. It's almost a spiritual necessity to meet up in groups like that -they build up and contribute to your soul and its connection to God the way a cell tower helps phones get a better signal.
#6 Healing + Prayer Over Wounded Places
I've talked about this before, but one day it would be great if groups of people could hold "marches" where they went to places of wounding (like the South where slavery was enacted) and pray over the massacres, the mass shootings, the torture, the lynchings, the wars fought, the children buried, the death camps, the concentration camps, the internment camps, the lands of mass genocide... Everywhere pain had been inflicted in the past and in the present and bring these places healing through prayer and candle light vigils.
#7 Journey to Love
They say the journey to really discovering love begins with loving yourself. But in reality, the journey doesn't usually play out that way.
-The first kind of love you come to know is family + friends.
-Then romantic partners or romantic interests
-Then Self at some point
-Then for a lot of people they discover love of God
-Then lastly -and it is almost always lastly -people discover a love for the world and everyone in it
For me the order was: God, Family + Friends, Self, World, Romantic Interests... but that's because I'm weird and my life has never been normal. :)
Ultimately you realize it all comes fro God and is a part of God in varying ways so ultimately it all goes back up and beyond into the everything that is God.
#8 A phrase that came to mind
"Love. What there is to fight for.
Pain. The fight itself.
Soul. The liberation of overcoming everything, returning to everything, and becoming everything."
Good news, I finally figured out why the color blue kept coming up -and even rainbows to a good extent.
Was passing by a hallway on my way to the bathroom at a spiritual center and passed by a series of artwork someone made involving the chakras. 2 pieces stood out in particular:
*Art by Diane Wright
The blue really stood out to me and I was drawn to them the most. But wasn't sure which chakras they were. I knew one was Throat/Speak Truth chakra -but not the other one.
So today I looked into it and discovered some things.
#1 Here are the chakras and another chart someone did one spiritual growth:
#2 Throat Chakra = Turquoise and Third Eye = Indigo (which explains why the color blue keeps coming up for me since I tend to hail in these 2 chakras in general).
#3 I was being shown the rainbow over and over and drawn to it to make me focus on CHAKRAS which are known for culminating in a rainbow. Rainbow = Pay attention to your chakras.
#4 My favorite colors have always been Blue, Purple, and Green -in that order, which kind of speaks to where I'm at spiritually.
-Spiritual perception and vision = Most Resonating
-Divine Connection to Peace and Heaven = Second Resonating
-Experiencing Love and Compassion = Third Resonating
My original interpretation of the colors had more to do with emotions or essence.
Blue = Calm, tranquil, relaxed, deep, mysterious
Purple = Elegance and Artistry
Green = Love of Nature
For me White -my 4th favorite color -represented Spirit and Innocence
And Black -my 5th favorite color -had more to do with all the colors coming together as one
But as it turns out the colors have a lot to do with chakras and which ones you tend to connect to the most.
I've seen this twice now:
But for me it's a little bit different. There are the "maturity" phases that a person goes through (like being a fan of a boy band at 12 years old). But then there's this other kind of "phase" which speaks more to what's happening with me now.
Once you've moved out of past phases of maturity you reach a new kind of phase which has more to do with thriving, bursting out, and blossoming and then incubating, secluding, and reflecting and then back to re-emerging, thriving, blossoming.
It's like being a butterfly phoenix that reaches a zenith/peak and then wilts back into itself that it might transform again into something greater and new.
I note the times in my life that I thrived and it was after the age of 23 or 24 when I genuinely came to understand myself. You can't really claim it before that time because you're still trying to figure life out in a lot of ways and not living it as much when you don't know who you are.
So right now I'm at peace with being in "cocoon" phase. It's a phase of patience and waiting -as it was when I was around the age of 24. Not much changes or happens. I draw more. I write more. I reflect on things incessantly. I grow. But I don't spring into action and put myself out in the world much.
But I KNOW -not just because it's happened before but because I understand this to be true -that I'm intended for great things and a new manifestation of life in a new way. A change.
Sometimes I wonder about the future because I try to be open to the possibilities. Then this happens.
Step 1. Tell yourself you're open to the possibilities
Step 2. DREAM. Of just about everything you would ever possibly want to be or do.
Step 3. Seriously start to doubt that any of it is possible
Step 4. Remind yourself GOD is possible. Get humble. Recalculate.
Step 5. Don't know what the hell the future is going to bring.
So I listen. And I wait. And I try to relax and remember it's in God's timing and it will be amazing in ways I haven't foreseen.
Drew this card yesterday which helped a lot:
Yesterday was a day of action. I did a lot and by mid-day felt very fulfilled and accomplished. Granted most of what I did consisted of cleaning the house, but it still seemed to be energizing and motivating.
Then again today it was a time for taking it easy, breathing, feeling free, healing, and overcoming worry.
I know that the time is coming to pop into the world again and contribute greatly. My greatest challenge is trying to Control the ability to see what's coming and the circumstances I'm in. It's hard to let go of the illusion of certainty and acknowledge you're in the unknown and just need to accept it.
But today at church there were some helpful examples of people who emerged out of their cocoon phase and finally found themselves on their truly intended path.
A woman named Lissa Rankin was a doctor/surgeon overworked, tired, and burned out after years of working in a hospital. She wanted to be a healer but that industry can turn you into a machine. So she quit in spite of being in debt, paying of student loans, and having a mortgage to pay. She went through cocoon phase which involved drawing, blogging, and attempting to write some books. Then she realized that HEALING was still her calling and that you can't quit your calling. She ended up finding a great group that focused on helping doctors find work-life balance and spiritual connection to themselves and patients. She ended up publishing some books and is thriving now.
Another man had followed his father's footsteps and become a minister. But after a decade of working in his church couldn't bring himself to do it anymore because he felt like he was lying to people. He hated telling people they had sinned before they were born and that God wanted people to burn in Hell. So he left. He went through cocoon phase. He worked as a salesman and at one point was a therapist. Then he came across a church that deeply inspired him and led him to return to his true calling. He ended up becoming a minister again and finally found a faith that allowed him to tell people about the wonder of God and the joys of Heaven available to any that sought it.
The message of today was to not see changes in life as threats, but as a opportunities to enact your true divinity. To step into a life that's more meaningful.
I've been drawn to Pinterest and Instagram searches lately with the focus mostly on nature -but yesterday went into rainbow-colored things.
Initially it seemed kind of random and I didn't know why I wanted to see pictures that had to do with rainbows, but it got me thinking and I realized a couple things.
#1 I tend to evade the colors red, orange, and yellow -which happen to be affiliated with movement and activity. I like the colors blue, purple, and green which are more affiliated with reflection and healing. Part of the problem I'm having right now is Immobility and not really experiencing much change or action. By taking in these colors affiliated with vibrancy and action -even if it's by taking them in via the rainbow -it helps gain the benefits of seeing those colors.
#2 I like rainbow colored things. It's pretty beautiful to see all the forms, artistry, nature, and designs that incorporate all these colors as a spectrum. It seems kind of therapeutic for some reason.
#3 I've come to the realization that there is something profoundly spiritual about all of the colors being represented. For Eastern religions it can refer to chakras. For Christians and other groups the rainbow is seen as a symbol of God's unity with people. It tends to come up in faith.
So here you go, the "Greatest Hits" of rainbow-related things:
Intuition and cards seem to be more and more on-point. I feel more drawn to doing things and just kind of go with it and stuff works out.
For example, there was some sort of shift and more and more intuitives/spiritual people have been following me on Instagram -and I've been following back most of the time. It means for some reason I'm attracting more positive people in some way.
Doreens Card that was drawn today was more about the state of moving on that I'm going through. Not just trying to literally move on and out, but also internally let go of clutter and old habits.
Then I felt compelled to meditate and use a card deck I usually don't draw from. It's the Medicine Cards by Jamie Sams and David Carson.
First I drew Black Panther -which was interesting because it came right after the Jaguar card in the book, which is my other main totem. Black Panthers are a type of Jaguar, so it's interesting to see this version of a similar animal totem.
Basically the Panther said to not fear the unknown, trust intuition, don't focus so much on mental distractions -focus more on Being. Expect blessings and that the unknown ultimately comes from God and the place of knowing that is Heaven.
Then I drew another card: The Bear.
Bear is about tapping into "inner cave" -aka intuitive places in the brain that help dreams and visions from Heaven come through. I've been asking to receive clearer visions through dreams since that's the way my dreams have been lately.
It also suggests not being distracted by the "advice" of others -which came up this week. It says to focus less on guessing and more on tapping into the space of knowing. It also mentions seeking solace in quiet/sleep or things that make you feel safe.
I do feel like I've been hibernating -which happens in winter. And with Colorado weather spring IS winter sometimes...
(Taken 1 week apart)...
