Finding my element...

I finally finished my last audio book and whilst I wait for my next one to arrive I decided to listen to an old favorite as I drove to my parent's house today. Some people more musically sophisticated than I may make fun, but I find true art in pop culture. And, I think that Come on Over by Shania Twain is a really musically rounded album. The thing I like most about it is that, unlike the recent work of almost all other country artists, it incorporates rock music alongside traditional country elements, instead of allowing them to take over. She blends the electric guitar riffs right in with the fiddle. It's awesome. The important thing is that country is a feeling more than anything else. And, when all of the signature elements of country music are taken away, that feeling is what is missing.

So it goes with life. Lately I have been more than busy. Busy is just a cute term for someone who works a lot. Truly busy is when you don't have a single moment to yourself. Lately, that is how my life has been, hence the lack of posts lately. I have my two jobs that maintain, and my two that sustain. My tutoring work and hotel job maintain me by paying the bills. But it is my art work- photography and writing- that sustain me. But I am learning that when I schedule every possible waking moment with one of these four things, I throw myself way off kilter. I lose that feeling that is the signature element of me. It's good to bring in new things every once in a while, but you gotta keep that one underlying element in place or it all falls apart.

So now the trick is finding out what the underlying element is. At first I thought working on my art was my way of holding onto myself. But even though I'm steadily increasing the time I devote to my art, I still was feeling something missing. Now I'm thinking it might be quiet alone time. One of the six books I am currently reading, The Artist's Way, is a 12 week course on finding your creativity. One of the assignments is to find one chunk of time each week to spend with yourself, doing something you enjoy. Last week I didn't have time for it. The result was breakdown. So my goal is to be more like Shania, add the electric guitar but keep the fiddle.