So yes, I’m still here. I haven’t been posting, or on Twitter, because, well, I’ve been having a rough few weeks health- and injury-wise, and general complaining is something I don’t want to write and I doubt you want to read.
The one good thing that’s come out of the crap, though, is a new coping tactic. I’m a long-time fan of art as therapy, but it is a thing that must be separated clearly from art with intent, for me at least. Art as therapy is not about the result, but the process, and if you are constantly making decisions about how best to communicate your intent, that can foul the process, at least from a therapeutic point of view.
When my pain levels are high, I can’t draw very well. My hand is unsteady, my eye unfocused. I don’t think through all the possibilities before making decisions. So if I have a particular piece in mind that I want to be good, that I want to communicate a certain idea, I can’t do it when my pain levels are jacked up, or I will get into the horrific downward spiral of making mistakes and blaming myself for them and I’m such a failure and how could I ever think I was a real artist and and and STOP.
But art is also one of the most effective pain-fighting tools I’ve got. When I’m doing art, I flow, become the process, and can block out the cacophony of misfiring nerves and aching joints. (I have to be careful that I don’t get so deep that I forget to stretch every once in a while!) This in turn offers an essential mental break from the sheer effort of managing the pain. For a while, a little while, it becomes automatic, almost easy.
How then to reconcile these two? For I am not happy doing art just for the sake of the process, as useful as it is. I have too many ideas, want too badly to communicate my worldview and change the world. And if I limit myself to art with intent, I prevent myself from using my best tool when I need it most.
So I now have two art projects going at any one time. (More than that, and the decision of what to work on becomes overwhelming.) My “intent” work, to keep my brain active and my hope of a revived career alive; and my therapy work, which is anything from just doodling to an intent piece without much technique to it, so I can lay down the initial sketch and then just turn my brain off, filling in the lines.
Amusingly, my current therapy piece started as an intent piece gone wrong, and is looking like it may turn into an intent piece again in the end. But the process is different, and that’s the important part.
Anyway, it seems to be helping. I’ve been able to do at least a few minutes of art on all but the absolute worst days, and that ties me back to myself when the pain threatens to shatter what’s left of me.



