The Artist’s Way – exercises 2

Week 3, Sense of Power

Detective work:

Favorite childhood toy? Miniature house interiors I created out of Kleenex boxes, then furnished and decorated. (They were not for dolls to play in.)

Favorite childhood game? Scrabble with my grandmother; also fun when my older cousins played too.

Best movie as a kid? Escape to Witch Mountain. The Man Who Would Be King. Time Bandits.

I don’t do it much but I enjoy . . . drawing. Doodling.

If I could lighten up a little, I let myself . . . make a party dress, designed by my inner 6 year old, for my 46 year old body. Something pretty and fun, the way little girls’ dresses are.

If it weren’t too late, I’d . . . learn to use the roller blades in my closet.

Favorite musical instrument? Accordion. Xylophone.

Amount of money to treat myself to entertainment per month? Probably close to $0.

What should I buy my inner artist? That set of picks, from Ace Hardware.

Taking time out for myself is . . . still hard.

I’m afraid that if I start dreaming . . . I’ll just be disappointed, if not heartbroken, when nothing works out.

Secretly enjoy reading? SFF for teens.

If I’d had a perfect childhood, I’d have grown up to be . . . an inventor, and eccentric but beloved genius.

My parents think artists are  . . . dead. All men. Unstable and unpleasant and quitters.

What makes me feel weird about this recovery is . . . I’m hoping the fifth time through The Artist’s Way process is the charm. But sorry I’ve needed 17 years of prep work to get this far.

Learning to trust myself is probably . . . the most important thing I could be doing.

Most cheer me up music? Disco. Sprightly love songs from country and pop. Stuff I can dance to. Examples: The Long Way Around by the Dixie Chicks. Nothin’ ‘Bout Love Makes Sense by LeAnn Rimes. I Melt With You by Modern English. And We Danced by the Hooters. Call Me Maybe by Carly Jepsen. KC & the Sunshine Band; the Bee Gees; the Pointer Sisters.

My favorite way to dress? Long skirts to twirl in; mismatched patterns; colorful.

Tasks:

5 traits I like in my childhood self?

1. Boundless curiosity
2. Adventurous
3. talked to plants and animals
4. well-developed sense of the ridiculous (odd sense of humor)
5. kindness

Self-destructive habits?

1. Letting people argue with me about my own feelings and opinions.
2. When I need encouragement, talking to people who are rarely encouraging. And then (predictably) feeling terrible afterwards.
3. Assuming that the way other people do things should be my own default way, without first investigating if that way actually works for me. When I gradually realize that way doesn’t, in fact, work for me, feeling like my own preferences are defective, and wrong, and I need to feel bad about them.

5 childhood accomplishments?

I could only think of two: (1) flew to New Mexico by myself, circa age 7; (2) won the school spelling bee, 8th grade.

5 people I wish I’d met who are dead?

1. Eleanor Roosevelt
2. Merriwether Lewis
3. Georgia O’Keeffe
4. Vyta Waskevich
5. Barbara McClintock

What traits do I find in these people that I can look for in my friends?

Spirit of adventure. Kindness. Joy. Hope. Love of beauty. Not just ‘being creative’, but actually creating. Iconoclast/courage to be different. Comfortable with a wide range of emotions, and with expressing them. Attachment to place. Intense relationships. Making friends with non-humans. Whimsy. Poetry.