I started to write my Morning Pages again, even if I usually don’t write them first thing in the morning (so how should I call these ? I should find it another name…) These 3 pages of free writing, without taking care of the meaning, of the form, of the potential mistakes helps me a lot to pull out thoughts off my head. And sometimes I cheat a little because I re-read despite the fact that Julia Cameron advises not to do so before a certain amount of time (7 weeks ? I have to check). I really do huge discoveries about myself, it brings stuff into focus; this exercice is really what I need currently and I’m glad I started it again (and don’t blame myself anymore when I miss a day).
My Morning Pages paired with today’s Connie‘s blogpost just made KABOOOOOOOOOOM in my mind.
Indeed, this week I noticed a pattern of thinking: why do I not share more my Art Journal pages ? And I finally understood why ! Here is partly what I wrote earlier this morning (it was in French so I translate):
My style is special because I am someone peculiar. I have my paradoxes. I am made of Darkness and of Light. Today, light predominates but it was not like this a few years ago; and sometimes Darkness takes over again. I drown into it, I’m like in a bubble filled with water, I move over the course of its flow but I stay grounded in the bottom. Until the day the bubble bursts as if nothing happened, and so I see the Light again. It’s how I work. For a long time I fought and wanted to go against cuntercurrent of my life, chasing the Spleen and wanting absolutely to be somebody else. But it was vain because it’s not the best. It was like I was fighting against windmill during a major tempest… I am affraid to let people see this dark side of me, whereas it now coexist nearly perfectly with my luminous side; they’re in me side by side.
I longly hesitated before sharing these words with you but felt like it was something I had to do.
A lot of my pages are… weird. I love them mucho but because of the fear of being judged, of people thinking “she should be in a mental institute, she’s totally depressed”, I kept them all for myself and my very close circle. It’s now time for me to share who I am with the World, and not who I think people would like me to be. I don’t deny my paradoxes and my past anymore.
So I’ll try to overcome this fear and to share more of who I am via my art journal pages 🙂
Honestly…I really like weird stuff. I like people genuinely expressing themselves! You are the whole you. I’m glad you’ll be sharing more! 🙂
I think it is hardest to share our dark sides, because they are not ‘pretty’ or ‘happy’, and I think society often makes it seem that we should always show a happy face, otherwise people won’t be interested or they’ll judge us. However I think those dark moments/creations can be the most expressive and revealing.
I was watching an interview with a Dutch comedian a while back, and she was saying that she used to be really scared of singing her ‘dark’ songs that were about very deep emotional issues that she had been through. She felt they were too weird and no one would understand. However once she started singing them and sharing them, it was exactly those songs that got the most heartfelt responses from people. People saying ‘I felt exactly the same, but couldn’t express it’ or ‘I had no idea other people had those feelings too’.
I really hope you will share some of those pages. Or even if you don’t, that would of course be fine, but just know that all your feelings, thoughts and moods are valid, no matter how dark or weird they seem.
Oh wow Nolwenn, the words you wrote in your morning pages is beautiful. Absolutely beautiful–in all it’s darkness in a sense.
I LOVE that you and I are on similar planes once again.
BIG, BIG Hugs,
Connie
*Big, huge hugs* I accept you with your darkness and your light and your weirdness. I think they match some of my own darknesses and lights and weirdnesses. Applause to you for sharing this, and thank you so much for putting it out there and sharing with us. <3 <3 <3
I started doing morning pages again last week & feel like it’s just been a bitchfest. I hope once I get all that out of my system, I can explore the paradoxes & weirdness I know is inside me. 🙂 Thank you for sharing this, it makes me feel not quite alone.
I believe We fear showing our dark side because we think we wont be loved but we all have a shadow.
We all have pain. We all have anger and jealousy and fear and when we deny expression of these things we grow more and more artificial and distant from our truth. I love that you can embrace all the aspects of yourself in your art.
Lynna