Flow 2

I had hoped to be further along when I posted the progress on my painting , but I had an unforeseen problem come up.  It’s 30 degrees outside here in Albuquerque today and my art studio is in a sun porch with no built-in heating.  I used a heater yesterday and got this far with applying local color for my first layer of the painting.  Today, since it’s so much colder, I turned on two heaters.  They blew a fuse, and, since I have to wait for someone to help me figure out which fuse it is, I probably am not going to be able to fix it anytime soon.

But, as I’ve realized, any challenge is always an opportunity.  This challenge gives me the opportunity to  demonstrate flow at its best.  This challenge, not having as much done to the painting as I would have liked, is actually a wonderful example of one of the dimensions of the flow experience:

There is freedom from worry about failure.

Because I’m doing this painting for the love of it, and, because I’ve already committed myself to exposing the painting progress, showing the work in its unfinished and raw state, not expecting anyone to love what they see, I’m in the flow.  Sharing this is making me happy because at least I did get enough paint in to show that I am making progress.  I’m doing this, sharing the progress, for the satisfaction it gives me.  I can’t fail because I don’t care about the outcome at this stage.

This is turning out to be more fun than I imagined.  I love the freedom this challenge is bringing up for me.  I love that there are people out there who are sharing this experience with me to keep me accountable.  Thank you for the time you’ve spent sharing this with me.

Doretta