Aries (March 21-April 19)
One of my favorite landscape painters makes a livable wage from selling her art. She has had many gallery showings and has garnered much critical acclaim. That's the good news. The bad news is that she feels obligated to keep churning out more landscape paintings -- even when her muse nudges her to take a detour into, say, abstract expressionism or surrealistic portraits. Galleries don't want anything from her except the stuff that has made her semi-famous. "Sometimes I fantasize about creating a series of 'Sock Puppet Monkeys Playing Poker,'" she told me. If she were an Aries, I'd advise her to do what I think you should do in 2010: Listen to what your version of the sock puppet monkeys are urging you to do.
All the end of the year posts are making me think that I should actually make one. Well, hot damn, I will make one.
This weekend I am hitting up the Portland Art Museum and the Portland Chinese Gardens. For so long, I had a partner to go eat dinner with and drag to random things so it has been a difficult adjustment to go back to the single life in Portland. I hope to make the transition much better in the next few months though. I want to take some classes at PCC for Photoshop or maybe a cooking class or calligraphy course. I have a few more bucks left on my Americorps education award so I thought it could come in handy right now.
The job search was on hold while I dealt with the grad school stuff but my employment agency is now working overtime to get people into positions. I really need something to come through because money is getting low. I am going to throw myself into finding temp positions and see what comes up.
Over the last few months, I did the whole "look within yourself" thing that I do pretty much every year. I am always striving to make myself better in some way. I am not sure if everyone does this but I am constantly mulling around thoughts and ideas in my head about why I am messed up, how to get out of the cycle, and what I want my future to be. Deep, huh? One of the greatest and most ridiculous revelations I had was the true reason why I am where I am at my life: I LACK FOLLOW THROUGH. It was an amazing discovery! I had thought over and over and over again about things in my life that did not go the way that I had hoped and then as I began the grad school process, I noticed an ugly trend in my thinking. I noticed that I was like "ugh, this is hard." Seriously, lame thinking on my part. I had to constantly remind myself that I need to keep pushing and trying. I had no idea that I needed such encouragement from myself and that this was really the core of my issues. I can relate it to my most recent college expedition all the way back to Americorps. I feel stupid and silly for having that be the revelation that came to me at the later age of 28 but now that I see what is going on, I hope that I can move on from it.
I thought about where I was ten years ago and think that there isn't much of a difference except that I am have completed my undergraduate rather than just starting it. Ten years ago was the beginning of my depression and I relate a lot of what has veered me off course with what happened around that time. It's pretty sad to think that I view the last 10 years as the "off course" rather than always trying to make the best of it. I am grateful for the experiences but never felt like I was where I was suppose to be. Perhaps I will never be where I am suppose to be but who cares!?! Who knows where any of us are even going? My goodness, I feel the pressure of knowing what is going to happen and thinking 80 miles in front of me at all times that it is frustrating.
For now, I know that I have completed my graduate school applications and if four of them fall through then I have a local option that will still help me in my future goals (if they let me in). I know that I need to be healthier and be active in the pursuit of a healthier mind, body, and soul. I need to be who I am without apologies. I need to surround myself with positivity. I need to surround myself with people that I have faith in.
That quote from PostSecret...
...is completely true in regards to myself. I have seen people come and go and while the going hurts me, I have to be myself since I am the one who has to live with me.
May the new year bring honesty, adventure, and breaths of fresh air to all!
No comments:
Post a Comment