Today I worked on my 100 bad paintings, probably my 1000 bad paintings. I think it is a test set by the Creativity Gods "Let's see how much she really wants this, does she have the stamina to keep showing up, bad painting after bad painting." Every now and then they throw me a tease, a little tasty bite of what may come if I keep at it, in a way that makes me feel like I'm close, that it's just around the corner. Of course its not, there's still 879, 989, 233 bad paintings to go, and my resolve bottoms out. I'm flattened and disillusioned and I wonder what the &^+^*&^% I'm doing. Always, though, the hunger, the desire, the need wins over and I come back ready to paint more bad paintings ever hopeful of that glimpse of a good one, of dancing with the muses, of co-creation with source, of something bigger and more beautiful than the parts that make it up. And each time I show up ready and willing to make a bad painting I remind myself that I learn something with every mark, every brush stroke, and I invite the muses in, throw caution to the wind and begin.
