I drew this figure on a train from Paris to Switzerland a couple years ago. Later, I took the drawing, inspired by a bronze sculpture I saw in Paris, and incorporated it into this Encaustic piece. I thought of it and what it meant to me when I read the following words:
“Anytime you’re gonna grow, you’re gonna lose something. You’re losing what you’re hanging onto to keep safe. You’re losing habits that you’re comfortable with, you’re losing familiarity.” ~ James Hillman
There is something lovely about the familiar. When we lose something familiar, we begin the grief process. It jolts us out of our sleep, wakes us up to the moment, perhaps even wakes us up to our life. The line in the poem below reminds me of staying awake. “Alertness is the hidden discipline of familiarity.” The familiar gives me great comfort. And it makes me wonder how much I am clinging to it and resisting the new because I have not stayed alert in the midst of my comfort? It takes intentionality to stay awake to our own lives. Creating things helps me stay alert. What keeps you awake to your one wild and precious life?
“Your great mistake is to act the drama
as if you were alone. As if life
were a progressive and cunning crime
with no witness to the tiny hidden
transgressions. To feel abandoned is to deny
the intimacy of your surroundings. Surely,
even you, at times, have felt the grand array;
the swelling presence, and the chorus, crowding
out your solo voice. You must note
the way the soap dish enables you,
or the window latch grants you freedom.
Alertness is the hidden discipline of familiarity.
The stairs are your mentor of things
to come, the doors have always been there
to frighten you and invite you,
and the tiny speaker in the phone
is your dream-ladder to divinity.
Put down the weight of your aloneness and ease into the
conversation. The kettle is singing
even as it pours you a drink, the cooking pots
have left their arrogant aloofness and
seen the good in you at last. All the birds
and creatures of the world are unutterably
themselves. Everything is waiting for you.”
~David Whyte~