Lisa Call

Home #3
©2008
10.5" x 8"
$550
Purchase Here

TUT

Today’s Notes from The Universe:

No one ever regrets raising the bar, Lisa, ever, ever, ever.

Scare yourself,
The Universe

I love these daily emails – they make me smile – and think, good thoughts.

Fear and my Purple Paint

I thought about my choices for the paint in my bedroom when I first read the email this morning. I was choosing the lighter purples because everyone always says to pick lighter colors for paint and etc etc. So I was following rules but when I did, it so was not what I wanted.

I want a really deep dark royal purple – so scare myself I did by daring to go with the darkest purple I could find. I’m sure I’m going to love the room. Sometimes I have to ignore everyone else’s voice and just go for it to get the results I want.

Raising the Bar

When I first starting writing about my studio addition I wrote about adding on a small studio and living small. Somewhere along the way I raised that bar and went for the studio I really wanted.

Sure there have been a few scary moments along the way (mostly when I get hooked by the fear around the stock market) but it is quickly put at bay because I know this is exactly what I need and want. Absolutely no regrets here.

Same story on raising my art prices. I finally owned my success (to copy a phrase from Christine Kane’s latest teleconference) and it feels great!

 
Where do you need to raise the bar in your life?

Upcoming Week

If things go as I believe they will, this weekend will be the last of my concentrated studio time for my bedroom studio. I think they are going to rip down the plastic walls and studs that currently comprise my son’s bedroom next week. Which means he will get to move into my bedroom, which will really be his bedroom when we are all done with this process.

That will leave me a bit homeless but not for too long. They are also going to tile my bathroom next week and as long as they put some doors on the house I might move down to my bedroom, even though it still needs trim and carpet and paint.

Or maybe none of this will happen and they will build me a porch instead. Who knows. I try not to worry about it too much.

A Weekend of Art

Although just in case this is my last chance for some serious studio time these are my goals for the weekend:

Saturday
1) 12 hours in studio
2) blog
3) journal
4) yoga
5) walk
6) to bed by 9:30

Sunday
1) 10 hours in studio
2) massage appointment at 3pm
3) blog
4) journal
5) yoga
6) walk
7) to bed by 9:30

A Habit?

This was a week of making decisions from trim to cabinets to roof to lights to tile to countertops to stairrails. Above are some of my choices: the paint chip circled is the color I will paint the outside of my house – with the corresponding roof color. On the right my cabinet colors (cranberry stain on maple wood) and counter tops (a gray formica). These will be in kitchen and bathroom. The tile board is for the tiles for my master bathroom that were ordered today.

It was a busy shopping week so most of my plans for studio time didn’t quite work out.

As this month is devoted to habits, my initial thought about the next few months was that I didn’t want to make a habit of any of this stuff. While its fun and really exciting to build a house and pick out all the colors it’s not something to repeat any time soon. At least for me.

But there is a habit here I want to keep, and that is of being a-okay with the present moment.

There was a morning this week where we had no hot water. I just though "oh well, pilot light blew out again" and went on. Didn’t phase me at all. The builder figured I’d be upset. Well, no, I chose to live in a construction zone, how crazy would it be to be upset that it’s actually a construction site?

Stuff happens. No reason to take it personally.

Joy

I didn’t blog last night because I didn’t feel like writing about non-art stuff, and that was all I had to say. Spent my evening enjoying my son’s high school elective showcase (where else in the world can one watch a light saber yoga performance, complete with star wars music, than at an expeditionary learning school?) and my daughter’s gymnastics class – she’s getting closer to a back handspring – yay!

Today was a more challenging day on the Joy front. I haven’t been feeling 100% lately so went to the dr and got some antibiotics and hope that improves things and I get some sleep cause being tired is not super conducive to celebrating joy.

Fortunately the day turned around after I got home from work and ran some errands with my daughter. While waiting around walgreens for my prescription she decided to buy presents for her friends from the 90% off aisle. We had much fun looking through the stuff for $.50. Twelve year olds can be quite entertaining when they want to be.

Art (Business) Related Content

I’m headed to the studio soon and hope to wrap up Lines #10 and #11 tonight so will post them tomorrow. In the meantime I recently read an interesting article by Seth Godin I wanted to pass along: The Internet is Almost Full

Ten years ago, you had a shot of at least being aware of everything that mattered. Five years ago, you had to be really selective about what you took in, but at least it was possible to know what you didn’t know. Today, it’s impossible. Today, you can’t even read every article on a thin slice of a thin topic.

You can’t keep up with the status of your friends on the social networks. No way. You can’t read every important blog… you can’t even read all the blogs that tell you what the important blogs are saying.

I absolutely agree. There are more art blogs out there that I want to read than I can possibly ever have time to read.

So the question is – what do I do about it?

Blogs

My solution was to decrease the number of blogs I wanted to keep up with. This frees up a bit of time so I’ve been checking out the blogs of my readers on occasion. I miss many of the blogs I’ve dropped but I don’t miss feeling like I was behind.

So increasing both depth and breadth and just letting it be than thinking I need to know everything everyone says every minute of the day. I’m enjoying this more relaxed approach to reading blogs quite a bit.

Keep Email Effective

My inbox is hovering around 80 unreplied to messages right now. I had it down to 10 not long ago. Sigh. I have yet to figure out how to keep up with it. For those of you awaiting an answer – sorry – and hopefully soon I will catch up.

I’ve decided to start scheduling email answering time because it is important and it takes a bunch of time. No more pretending I can just fit it in here and there.

Last year I reduced the amount of email I get by filtering anything not art related or personal related to another email address. I then diverted all art related newsletters to another email address. I almost never check the junk email address and occasionally will check the other.

There are a couple of exceptions to this – the top one being Alyson Stanfield. Her newsletter is the best and I look forward to it every monday morning right in my main email inbox. Tis a rare monday I don’t read it.

If you don’t already have it, check out Alyson’s book I’d Rather Be in The Studio, it’s awesome (and not just cause there is a quote from me int there). If I didn’t already have it, this book would be on my christmas list.

Another thing I’ve done to reduce interuptions is to turn off all email notifications from twitter and facebook. I can catch up with those things when I go to the sites. I don’t need inbox filled with friend requests when I get a notification on facebook also.

Thank You

As a blog writer, I appreciate that you have way more choices for reading than about art than ever before and I want to, again, thank all of you for choosing to spend a bit of that time reading my blog, tweets and status updates on facebook.

How do you keep up (or not) with the internet?

Morning Aspens
by Stacey Peterson
Oil on Panel
9×12″
2008
reprinted with permission by the artist

Being Decisive

I think one reason I get so much done is I’m good at making decisions, meaning that when presented with choices I don’t spend days or weeks or months deciding what to do. I just decide. Then I do it.

When I decluttered my house at the beginning of the year I had no intention of moving at that time. But once the idea that I really could move came to me, I didn’t ponder it forever. I simply decided to move based on how that decision felt to me and within a week I had a Realtor lined up and got to work making it happen. I went from thinking "Hm, maybe I could move" to living in my new house in only 3 months.

One of my strengths is my intuition. I rarely sit down and make lists of advantages and disadvantages of doing something. I just listen to my feelings and pick the choice that feels right and move forward. I do journal and find writing (not list making) helps me listen my desires.

I don’t believe that every decision has a wrong and a right choice. I think there are pros and cons to all choices. So I focus on the positives of my direction and don’t let the negative aspects stop me.

This isn’t to say I don’t sometimes decide my choice wasn’t the best for me. So then I just change my mind and do something else. And once that decision is made then I just move forward in the new direction.

It’s hard to make forward progress and put energy anywhere if I don’t make a decision as to which direction to go. So step one is to decide. When I’m feeling low on energy I often find that I haven’t gotten clear about a decision that needs to be made. Making that decision releases all sorts of energy and starts propelling me towards my future.

If you are feeling like you don’t have the energy to devote to a project are you fully committed and have you truly decided that is the direction you should go? Maybe making a solid decision is the first step in boosting your energy.

Construction Zone

Tomorrow’s the big day – construction on my new studio begins. I spent a large portion of the weekend preparing my house for the event.

First up will be removal of the asbestos siding. Originally I thought I’d do this work myself. Then I decided that was a bit insane so I’ve hired asbestos removal people to do it. Once the siding is gone the builder can start and will begin by ripping the moldy shed off the back of the garage, which will create a pathway, through the garage, for the big digging thing to get to my backyard to dig a basement.

Pictures of the progress will start tomorrow and if things go as intended the artwork will also continue.

Morning Aspens

I love Stacey Peterson’s paintings of the Colorado landscape and have been saving up to purchase one for about a year. When she posted the photo of the above painting on her blog I knew instantly (there’s that intuitive decision making thing) it was the one I wanted and am happy to report it arrived at my house this week.

Stacey’s blog is one of my favorites. She’s my role model: she quit her technical job to support herself with her art and she lives in the Colorado mountains. Plus she’s really organized and hates clutter – my kind of person!

Depending on how messy it gets around here during construction the painting might have to live somewhere else for few months but right now it’s on the wall in my living room and I’m definitely enjoying it.

Now time to start saving up for the next artist’s work I covet.

The Achiever

I am a type 3 on the enneagram, The Success-Oriented, Pragmatic Type:Adaptable, Excelling, Driven, and Image-Conscious. So I come by my energy partly to fulfill all of that success-oriented drive that I have. Definitely that is the upside of being a three, but just like all of the types, there are plenty of downsides.

All the image oriented stuff. Ugh – yeah – at times that can be me. And the "never ever admit you might have a flaw" stuff. Yep – me also.

Threes are excellent at getting things done. I have a ton of energy and am always up for doing stuff. The flip side is I’m less adept and relaxing. This year I made creating space a priority and in addition to my (near) daily yoga practice I look for ways to slow down and relax. Finding a boyfriend that lives in the mountains has been a big help in that direction.

Myers-Briggs Type Indicator

The photo at the top of this post is of 3 new catalog covers that feature images of my artwork (Structures #14, Structures #11 and Structures #46). The catalogs are teaching resources for a company that does a lot of Myers-Briggs training and testing.

I love this personality type stuff so was thrilled with they asked for images earlier this year. I just got the completed catalog covers in the mail this week.

I’m an INTJ the Myers-Briggs world. Which explains all of my planning and list making skills. And my geek side. My natural preference is to be organized and efficient which amplifies my energy as I rarely waste much of it:

INTJs are ambitious, self-confident, deliberate, long-range thinkers. They dislike messiness and inefficiency, and anything that is muddled or unclear. They value clarity and efficiency, and will put enormous amounts of energy and time into consolidating their insights into structured patterns.
…
INTJs have a tremendous amount of ability to accomplish great things. They have insight into the Big Picture, and are driven to synthesize their concepts into solid plans of action.

Playing to Strengths

There are a lot of people that find these personality indicators to be a bunch of junk and admittedly there is no scientific proof they are accurate. But I believe they are useful in helping to identify patterns and preferences and when used to aid in personal growth they can be extremely valuable.

This information can be used to identify the positive parts of my natural inclinations. Knowing what I might be good at is helpful in taking those those strengths and expanding them.

Not an Excuse

Even more helpful is understanding my weaknesses so I have a reference point for how to move forward past those potential road blocks.

It’s easy to read personality type indicators like the enneagram or myers-briggs and use it as a way of staying stuck. Easy to think "Oh well I a _____, might as well accept this is the way I am" and just be that way.

While I don’t think I can change who I am fundamentally, I know I can change my thoughts and my attitude and the past year I’ve done a lot in that direction.

Using these tests as an excuse for bad behavior or using them to limit my choices or abilities is not acceptable.

Self Doubts

This afternoon I returned home from a wonderful weekend in the mountains with Jim followed by brunch with some artist friends. It was an excellent weekend. [photo above taken on a beautiful drive we took on saturday].

Not long after returning home I found myself in a less than happy mood full of the type of self doubts that rarely rear their ugly head anymore. Keeping a gratitude journal and focusing on all the positive things in my life the past year has really helped keep me grounded.

But for some reason this afternoon my mind was saying something like this:

Why are you making art? Why not just go to the day job and come home and relax? Making art is a lot of work and what do you have to show for it? Why are you building a studio? Do you really think you deserve a huge new studio in this economy? Why are you making art anyway? What value does it have? Why do you think you can sell it and live off your art? Get real.

etc, etc. I suspect most artists can relate.

I knew I was headed in a bad direction that could bring art production to a halt for the week and possibly the month, if I continued to have this little pity party for myself.

So I took a nap since I lack motivation to do anything else. I woke up in the same mood.

So I called a friend and whined. They were supportive as they could be but I was being annoying and this little pity party wasn’t going to go away after a few nice words. This was my responsibility to end, not someone else.

Score One for My Mind

So I thought to myself: you have been here before and you have 2 choices. Let this win and spend the entire evening/week/month online doing nothing or maybe you could try something different and just get over yourself.

So I went to my studio and just got to work making art. I wandered off after 10 minutes but pulled myself back to the studio after a bit. I was determined that even if I couldn’t shake the feeling I was going to at least get something done.

I was in a pretty pissy mood and had plenty of negative thoughts and it was rough going at first. I tried to think of something I was grateful for and could think of nothing. Eventually I got the focus to interrupt the stream of negativity and reminded myself how much I love to make art and slowly I could bring in other things I was grateful for.

My mantra was "Art is valuable, My art is valuable". I started repeated it over and over again when I caught my mind having a little pity party.

I also asked myself what I was gaining by thinking all these negative thoughts. I can’t say I came up with a good answer for this but I did decide I wasn’t gaining anything I wanted and that helped to put an end to the unpleasantness in my head.

After 3 1/2 hours the positive thoughts won and the self doubt and negative voice was put back in the box as it doesn’t serve me right now. Yay.

I’m really excited about the textile painting I was working on and Home #2 should be done tomorrow and I’ll post a photo of it.

Deb Kirkeeide wrote the following comment on my last post (the crazy birthday party weekend for my daughter):

I’m exhausted! How do you keep such focus? And when do you have time for fun and relaxation? I admire your fortitude.

Very good question Deb. Recently I listened to the book The Total Money Makeover: A Proven Plan for Financial Fitness by Dave Ramsey. He’s the debt free guy. While I don’t agree with all he says, nor do I like some of how he delivers his message (I think the belittling and sarcasm are way over done), he makes a lot of good points.

What struck me listening to this book was how his line:

Live like noone else,
so you can
Live like noone else.

applies to many of the choices on how I am currently spending my time. I am very busy with 2 full time careers and kids and a house, etc. I’m making choices today so in the (very near) future I can be a fulltime self supporting artist that doesn’t have to scramble for money. Those choices have me living today as very few people are willing to live: staying super focused and not having tons of time for just sitting about. I believe the pay off in the future will be well worth it.

The alternatives don’t sound very attractive to me.

1) Just work the day job and wait until I retire to make art (no way!)
2) Quit the day job and struggle for money (also not for me)

I wouldn’t object to finding a wealthy art patron that would support me but that sounds like a recipe for disaster as these types tend to have hidden agendas and I’m not good at being told how to live my life.

 
But not everyday is a day full of goals and craziness like last weekend. Today, I’ve got nothing on the todo list that I must get done. Just doing what I feel like doing cause it’s my birthday. Yay! Chocolate for everyone on me.

And next weekend – I’ve told the kids I will not drive them anywhere – I’m going to get in some studio time.

Priorities

In my series of posts on holding intent I’ve talked about some of the quotes I have on my studio wall. Here’s another related to priorities:

My Take on the Parts

What: I need to identify the specific tasks, or at the minimum the next task, that will get me to my goal. Without this breakdown of the parts it’s hard to identify the next action I should take to achieve a goal. Priorities imply that there are things to choose from, I need to identify those things.

I: There is only 1 person that is in charge of me reaching my goals – and it’s me. Taking responsibility for all of my choices and actions is a huge help in reaching my goals. It is not the internet’s fault that I waste time reading email and blogs, it was my choice. If I don’t like that choice and I can change it.

Doing: If I just sit around it’s unlikely my goals will be met.

Right Now: Worrying about the future or stressing out about the past isn’t going to move me forward. It’s when I stay in the present moment I make progress.

Closer: This is a process (and not a quick one), not a destination. Doing things gets me closer to my goals but I need to be patient and enjoy the journey, because without that the goal is rather empty. For me it’s about a life time commitment to living life one day at a time with the intention to be the person I want to be and living the life I want to have each day giving my situation in that exact moment.

Ultimate Goal: If I don’t know what I want and who I want to be, it’s kind of hard to make progress in that direction.

The Universe

On Alyson Standfield’s recommendation in January I signed up to get Notes from the Universe. I love these emails each morning as they make me smile and remind me that my thoughts do become my reality. Today’s was particularly relevant to my topic:

Where are you spending your time?