Live the questions now.

"Try to love the questions themselves as if they were locked rooms or books written in a very foreign language. Don't search for the answers, which could not be given to you now, because you would not be able to live them. And the point is to live everything. Live the questions now. Perhaps then, someday far in the future, you will gradually, without even noticing it, live your way into the answer." 

- Rainer Maria Rilke

I admit I was not feeling very inspired or motivated to even go to my studio today. Resistance can show up in an endless number of ways, and today my mind was overtaking me with "there's no point...there's only a few hours left of the day, what can you possibly accomplish anyway?" Lucky for me I chose to dismiss these thoughts and pushed myself out the door. The Universe likes to sneak these little lessons in doesn't it? Hidden beneath my resistance today - and actually on and off for some time now - is this desire to just know already.... where am I headed to? What I am I working toward? What is the next step? How do I get there? Am I good enough to even get there? Not to mention....where is there again? These always seem like questions that loom over me, creating a huge sense of uncertainty and leading to restlessness. It's so often an unconscious questioning and longing... with a *false* sense of feeling that if only I knew I'd feel certain and more confident in my creative path. 

Today while trying to find my inspiration and motivation to start I started flicking through the various art books on my table. I came across the quote above while reading through Kelly Rae's lovely book 'Taking Flight'. I happened to open up to the chapter titled "embracing the journey" where Kelly Rae talks about how sometimes it is in the not knowing that we can find the most clarity and freedom. What would happen if I let go of the need to answer these questions and know all the time? What if I let go of the need to create for something and simply just painted for the sake of it. What if I allowed myself to put aside the need to decide what direction to take and just sit with this whole process for awhile, allowing the process itself to unfold in its own time. For me it is hard to sit 'still' with these questions - I am so easily caught up in the motion of things and like to feel like I'm constantly moving forward. Even though I know it is often in the slowing down that breakthroughs can really happen. Ironically it is sometimes in stillness that we can actually move forward in terms of creative growth. 

I also believe the commitment to do the work is so important, and perhaps this is the balance to work toward - committing to working at the process and letting go of the need to 'accomplish' at the same time. When we show up, no matter what state we may be in mentally or emotionally, we honour the deeper longing of the creative spirit, acknowledging the present but being receptive to whatever may be ahead. And so often this act of doing is what sparks inspiration in a way that is authentic to you. So, live the questions now. Show up, and, ask the questions. Allow them, acknowledge them... live them. Stop trying to answer them and figure it all out - just allow. Allow the answers to come freely and naturally unfold as they need to, not as you feel you need them. In asking the questions we enable ourselves to look more deeply, and when we look more deeply, we connect. It is in this place of connection that there can eventually be knowing.

* Peace, Joy & Gratitude *