WHO CARES?!?

For some time, I’ve felt like a somewhat formal introduction has been necessary to free myself up to create and share from a more authentic place. In the future, I’d love to write prose pieces from a more objective standpoint on a variety of topics, but first, I feel that it’s important to reastablish where I’m coming from. Here I am, more or less:

In recent months, I’ve been growing out of feeling like I have something to prove. When I think about who I was in high school, and college, throughout all of my jobs, it’s beautiful to say that the past two years have felt the most authentic. As this corresponds to how I show up to my creativity, and to what I wish to express to others, I’ve been a little bit at a loss. When I consider the general “public” on a platform such as Instagram, I can’t help but become bombarded by my own assumptions of how I’m being perceived by people who have experienced me through the lense of one limited version of who I am, or who I was. 

There have been so many iterations of myself and so many potential perceptions of others that I’ve let that taint my approach to my own life. I censor myself, and I call myself a proponent of vulnerability. I may be who you know or knew as the quiet girl, the smart girl, the crazy girl from the twelfth floor, the weird girl (still true), the super religious girl?, the artist, the reader, okay now she’s posing nude, okay now she’s writing, okay but does she still go to church??, she’s going to queer open mics now so is she gay??? Who cares? Maybe some, and really it doesn’t matter, but mostly for my own sake, I’d like to smooth some things out.

The answer seems ever evasive to the ever pressing question of what I specifically want to share with the world and how much to reveal. I’m not trying to be mysterious, I’m just trying to discern what the most crucial points of connection actually are. 

So yes, I go to queer open mics because I qualify, and I’ve taken for granted the knowledge that I’m loved and accepted no matter what by those closest to me. It’s a shame and a sadness to know that many people cannot say the same. Yes, I faithfully went to church for about three years after dropping out of college and dealing with everything that it entailed the best way I knew how. I’m still very spiritual, and I don’t always like to broadcast it because I fear that I’ll come off as either crazy or that I’m exploiting my own relationship to the source of all existence. That topic as a whole is something that I am very excited to make art about, and I know that as I continue to research and learn, I’ll better discern what to do from there. 

Painting, ceramics/sculpting, modeling, writing, reading, hosting a book club, dancing, learning about herbalism, studying spirituality, philosophy, psychology, comparative religion, tending to my own spirit, being a good family member, friend, and community member, makeup, clothes, tattoos, an irreverent sense of humor. These are a few of my main components. Who cares? Maybe you, maybe not. 

I feel better knowing that I’ve clarified where I’m coming from. It’s freed me up to remain bold in my sentimental mission to stay committed to living my life in accordance to the highest execution of purpose, to be as brave as possible in whatever circumstances that I may face, and to fully embrace and take advantage of the blessing of having the freedom to create whatever calls out from my spirit to be a balm for the spirits of others. Who cares? I do, and that’s enough.