do.be.do.

(i know, we've all been told to avoid taking pictures of our own feet, as its been done, again and again, by every young girl that's ever picked up a camera. but i must confess i sort of love it. at least, i enjoy seeing other photographers place their toes in their memories, and every once in a while i love to do it myself. there is something so satisfying in making a real photographic record of the fact that i'm here, since more often than not that is merely implied.)

lately i have been meditating on how to continue to produce in the way that i am inclined, but without any particular outcome in mind. this is hard, as i come from a family of dreamers. doers, yes, and big doers at that, but even bigger dreamers. my father is always inventing things... talks a lot about them with a smirk on his face & a sparkle in his eye, but the reward of our being excited and impressed seems to be reward enough for him. inevitably we will all read about his invention some time later; about the millions someone is making doing just what we had all listened and talked and laughed about some weeks or months or years before.

my first experience with this on a more personal level was when i was maybe 14 years old. my oldest brother was headed to Puerto Rico for a school year abroad & i decided to make him a hug that he could bring with him. i fashioned two hand-shaped pieces of fleece each with velcro and sewed them to either end of a long strip of some other soft fabric. picture a frumpy fabric necklace with life-sized, velcro-ed hands as the clasp. i garnered great praise for such a 'cute' idea, and my encouraging elders said i ought to make more, that i'd 'make a killing.' well, of course i didn't make more, as i was (and still am) inclined to let too many "practical" "problems" stop me from proceeding. and wouldn't you know, 3 months or so later my grandmother shared a newspaper article about a woman who had made a small fortune on her handmade "hugs" (which were indeed exactly like mine in function & general design, but of a much more polished quality).

so swirls the collective unconscious.

needless to say, i never really developed a good internal recipe for seeing things to fruition. the problem, i've realized, is that the talking and the dreaming takes off in a sprint that grows in speed and enthusiasm exponentially faster than the work being done. nothing at all can happen without a kinetic engagement in the process... there is nothing wrong with talking, but too much talk can lead to too much practical reasoning (why something might not work or might not be successful), and ultimately a fizzling of early action.

anyway, i think i've realized that in order to see success with anything, i need to just do. and be. in other words, i need not muddy my creative energies with talk about what a particular endeavor might get me, or where i might end up. i need to just do because the doing is what feeds my soul. and a well-fed soul sees a body to great successes. a lot more positive movement can occur in the universe (and therefore within my [historically convoluted] path here) if i stop 'swimming' so hard & just find the current and go with it. because there definitely is one, and dude: its really strong. and ironically enough, by always thinking so hard and trying so hard, i've been keeping myself stuck in one place. lately i am hearing -- indeed i've been hearing for most of my life, but not actually understanding until now -- in subtle and not-so-subtle ways, that in order to end up in a place of abundance and prosperity one should simply be their truest them. from there the rest will work itself out. so here i am attempting to fully embrace "unproductive" stay-at-home-mommyhood, and make things when i can, with maybe fabric or clay or wood & nails, but definitely with joy.