Robin's Playground. Week six.

I so regret having lost the paper where I wrote down all the ideas I had for prompts. Because now when I sit here and need to write this post my mind goes blank.

I'll just wait a second.

What has been going on in my mind and life this week? A lot about stress. A lot about being a mother. One word that has been popping up in my head for longer than just this week is care. I need to care for my family. I need to care for myself in order to be able to do so. And what is this "care"? Now that I'm writing to you I get this image in my head of a nest to crawl up into that is soft and cradles me. Maybe we should do that!

This weeks task/challenge/prompt is hereby called:

A mother's nest.

As in a nest for the mama. Where she can feel cared for and rest and fill up on inspiration. Or get wild and feel free. Or... What do you need to care for yourself? If you don't have any children you still probably have other persons or projects, or maybe animals that you feel responsible for, love and wish to see grow and that you want to nurture... What do you need to make the mama aspect of yourself feel cared for so that she can be the best mama to whatever needs mothering in your life?

Maybe a sculpture this week? Or a soundcave? Maybe one of those boxes where you stick your hand in and feel different textures? Hmmm. Possibilities are plenty!

Here is a picture of where I would place my nest:

Love!

My magical wand.

I cannot believe it has been another week!
Again!

I had supermany ideas about all the magic I wanted to create this week, but oh no. I sit now on wednesday evening, and I have just spent five minutes creating my magical wand. It doesn't feel bad though. I picked the stick several weeks ago because I just liked it. And it has been sitting on the desk where I am supposed to work since. I don't do any work there. I just put things there, and then when I feel like working or creating I spread the stuff out all over the appartment. And then when I'm done I curse the hardship of womenhood because we always have to tidy up so much :).

There has been a tiny bit of magic this week though. I have been stressing more and more about my situation, as you know. But yesterday when I sat translating a "thing" I am working on I came across a question I used a lot in my work with people suffering from stressrelated diseases or existential/lifesituatoin dilemmas/problems:

What is my life task right now?


It was asked by a psychologist called Erik E. Eriksson in his book about human development through the different ages of a lifetime. His perspective was that in every stage of life there is a certain task in focus. And this task is something most of what we do circulates around. For example when we are teenagers our task is to search for an identity - so we do a lot of experimenting with clothes, taste in music, political opinions, how we relate to the other sex and so on. I used the question to make people think of what the main thing they need to do right now is about. And I figured, ok, I'll ask myself.

And the answer burst out imediatly: To be a mother to my children. That is pretty obvious to everyone I suppose, but to me it felt like a welcome revelation. This is what I need to do. Be a mother. Everything else is secondary. Of course I need to find an income, but that is secondary to mothering. And it was like a big sigh went through my body and released a loooooot of tension.

And you know what? Suddenly I found energy, and joy, and patience, and a desire to create and ideas to turn into creations. MAGIC!

Very simple and maybe banal, but that's allright by me :). The words are: Joy, love, From now on my life shall be magical. Mama Nature will mother me so I can bring magic to my kids.

What magic happend this week in your life?

future.

So, as you know my situation is this:

I don't have a job.
No matter how much I choose to believe in myself, my business is most likely not going to be running smoothly tomorrow.
Come september, I must have an income.

I have been depressed about this. I have been stressed. I have been angry and suffered from anxiety.

Tonight while putting my son to bed (it took a while, so I had some time on my hands with nothing to do but cuddle and caress hair) I played a little game: If I got to make up own job what would it be:

A couple of examples of what I came up with:

Curious Explorer of Things Known and Unknown.
Traveler in and Expander of The World of Arts and Creativity.
Liberator of Women's Bodies.
Weaver of Stories that Set Hearts Free.
Creator of Magical Chambers of Vision and Sound.

Easy peasy japanese!

What would your job(s) be if you could make it up yourself?

Here I would like to have an image of myself as allready in one of these profession. I lacked prompts and disguise, unfortunately.

Love!

I remind myself.

When things feel really difficult, this, amongst other things, is what I try to remember. Because I truly believe it. I have seen it work wonders with some clients I had when I worked. The sentence is my reaction to this thing that some people would say: there is a meaning to everything. In some situations that just didn't feel right. Like if somebody has lost a child to suicide, or has given up their whole identity to be the woman their man says he wants, or when a father to be suddenly drops dead without explanation. Maybe there is a meaning to be found, especially when one looks back on the life one has lived it may become obvious. But when one is in the middle of things, and they don't need to be so grave as the examples I gave, I feel it is a bit gentler to think that there is a possibility to learn something. It can be a possibility to learn to open up to one's emotions, even the difficult ones. Or a possibility to learn how to help others - many who go through difficulties find the inspiration to support and help others in similar situations. Maybe there is an opportunity to finally learn how to speak one's own proper truth.

I try to see what I am supposed to learn from where I am now. Probably patience and persistance. Maybe I need to learn where my limits really are - maybe I need an experience of really pushing myself harder to see that. Maybe I need to learn how to care for myself even when I don't see how I will have the time or energy to. Whatever it is, I am absolutly sure that it will be clear to me in a matter of time, and I will think, ah.... that was this was all about for me ;).

What lessons do you face right now?

I really need to go to the hairdresser. That is what I learn from whatching this photo :).

Oh, and when I write something about my job, I never write about actual cases, ever. I really really really find the vow of secrecy absolutely essential and beautiful and would never brake it.

Love!

Robin's Playground week five.

Time is moving so fast. And so slow at the same time.

I am desperatly seeking a job. Got a couple of turndowns today. And a couple of new possible contacts.

I am desperatly seeking sleep. As in several hours of sleep in a row. Deep sleep. Uninterupted.

I am desperatly seeking time. To do all these things that I want to. Being a mother to my children - and not just transporting them around and giving them food when hungry. Sending applications. Drawing. Singing. Writing. Networking. Blogging. There is not enough of it.

And just a minute ago I was desperatly seeking my list of ideas for projects at this Playground. Gone, oh no!

Wouldn't it be nice to have a magic wand to sweep around and stop time/make children sleep nice and sound/find lost papers? And there it is: This week the task shall be to make a magic wand.

Maybe we should also make a little bit about what we would use it for.

Actually it doesn't have to be a wand. It can be anything you feel would be magic bearing to you. Such as a rime, or a rythm, or a symbol, a shield, something.

What is magical to you?
In what ways are you magical?
In what areas of your life do you feel you would need some magic?
How would it change things?
What could you do today to add some magic to your life or to celebrate the magic in LIFE?

Love!

sun.

I haven't had much time.

Like usual.

But I played around a bit, and a scetch I made looks allright I guess :).

So here is my sun:

Now that I have my scanner I really have to start using it. End of these crappy photos (except this one turned out ok). Old habits dy hard...

Love!

a long talk much needed.

The other day, no yesterday, time is floating but it was yesterday. So, yesterday I went to rehearsal with Kajsa. We wanted to start of by having a cup of coffee in the sunshine and talk through maybe our schedule, the order of things, maybe read the texts through.

But instead we started talking. About all these things that have been stressing me out lately. How do you create a life that functions and still evolve into the artist you want to be? How do you balance the creative life and everyday life? What does being an artist mean to me, now? How to balance one's needs and the needs of the children and the household and looking for a job?

I wanted to recapture some of what we said, but notice now that it is difficult. And maybe the words weren't the essence. Maybe the essence was this:

Laying on a bench, listening to baby L moving about in the grass chewing on cones, gazing up into the moving leaves of a tree, being warmed by the sun shining through the foliage.

One thing that I bring with me in my heart, that she said is this:

I have felt shame for my need to be seen and to show my "art". Sometimes I feel like I'm still five years old, running to mummy, holding out what I made, desperate for acknowledgement - yes, my love, you are an artist. That five-yearold is still looking for recognition, so I hold out my drawings and writings to my friends, to you. Look! Look! And I have felt that maybe it is a bit pathetic. (Well, that was me talking, here comes:)

But Kajsa just said "Of course you want people to see! Who are we if we are not seen? Everybody needs the mirror of others. Especially when we are trying to evolve creatively. That is not something that can be done in complete isolation. At least not by most. To have other people see what we do and acknowledge it is essential."

So, I am so grateful for those words. And will continue to show up here to meet you. Because I need to be seen. And because I want to show you, if you feel like I do, that you are not alone. And maybe some day I will have the honor to be the one to also mirror you. It has happened once during the Playground Project and it totally lit my day up :).

To be mirrored properly, we also have to have the courage to be truthful and show ourselves as we are. No more, no less. The good and the bad. Our brightest glimmering sunsides, and our darkest muskiest shadows.  And we have to have the courage to welcome and see all those aspects in the people we hold dear. Easier said than done, I know. But isn't it necessary if we want to make this world a better place? If we want to be great parents? Friends? I will try to be as courageous as I can!

All my love!

selfportraits.

I was feeling really low.

Like a saying in hungarian: under the frogs ass. Because how much lower could you possibly get?

Anyways I had that annoying critic babbling away in my mind: nothing you do is valuable, you are a fake and a fraud, nobody cares about you or what you do on and on.

So what?!

So what if nobody cares? I care.

So what if what I do has no value for anybody else? It is important to me.

And if I'm a fake and a fraud, than ok, that's what I am then. I'll be a good one :).


And I felt an urge to just capture myself as me, the one I am in this (and this and this and this...) instant. No more no less. Confused, happy, fragmented, sad, philosophing, empty, full of love.

We are all so much.

There is no such thing as a fixed I. We are all made up of millions of fragments, shimmering and dancing, like the sun's reflections on moving water.

Everything changes. All the time. And that is frightening and wonderful at the same time.

And so that was me yesterday.

Who are you right now? How would you picture yourself? How would you like to see yourself?

Love!

where I get my hands dirty.

It doesn't look like much.

It really isn't much either. Maybe two meters times one and a half. Maybe.

But I love it, love it, love it!

I know the time I get to have it is limited, since it belongs to a proprietor I don't live with, and as soon as somebody there wants it I'm out. But I am going to cherish every moment I get to shove my fingers into the earth, digging, weeding, planting, harvesting.

Or just taking a quick peek at how things are going when I pass by. Which I do several times a day.

Lovely strawberries in the making.

Tiny blue bells in the middle of something I don't know what it is. Excited to find out!

Another mystery that has come to life again since I disposed of the weedcarpet year.

A very thin and a bit lopsided gentleman that I hope will give me beens.

I know it's a flower... I hope it is brightly coloured! 

My grandmother had truly green fingers (do you say that in english? It means she was fabulous with plants). I hope that inheritance will come alive in me as well. So far I think the colour that best describes my fingers in this area is black, haha! Rare are the plants to have survived my love :).

Love!

Week four of Project Playground.

It is evening again, and I sit again sweating a bit because I want to make this week's prompt tempting. I have so many other things on my mind.  Not only confusion about the future and stress. Also very nice things such as this: 

I have also been digging and planting in my elotment. I hope to get a little bit more order and growth there this year than last year. Last year was the first year I got to use it after it had been unused for quite a number of years, so I think it will take a while before it gives really good crops. If it ever does. It doesn't really matter. Not much anyway. What matters is the happiness I feel while being there. And to see my daughter dig her hands down in the earth, and my son run around it laughing, helping pull weeds and put seeds in the ground. I forgot my camera today, but hope to get some pictures tomorrow.

Now. To the project.

I have been enjoying the sun so much that I feel a tribute is in order. So that is what the project for this week is - to make a tribute to the sun. There are many to be inspired by in all kinds of media (maybe make a collage?). You can of course make a drawing or painting, you can write a poem, but also write a lovesong or other musical piece! Anything can be used. I ran out of paper one day, but found paper plates from a birthday some years ago and drew on that (terrible photo again, sorry about that, hehe):

Love!

I admit it. I feel lost again.

Totally.

And I wonder why it is that I have to do this: toss everything inside of me up into the air so often I never feel really settled. For a while I felt I was getting there. Slowly, but still getting there. Slowly polishing an illustration, and then another. Slowly brainstorming about ideas and slowly sorting through them to try and feel where I should lay my focus and when. Slowly reading books about creative business to see if I could learn of a way to do this.

Because I don't know.

I really don't know how all those other mothers do it. I don't. I read descriptions of work during naps, during nights and with baby by the feet. And I try. But I can't make it work. Naptime works ok sometimes. If we are not out walking. Which is usually when baby falls asleep. So I try to keep all my art and business things in a bag. Packing and unpacking and sometimes actually managing to bring what I need/want. Nights? What a joke! It is 9.30 now. Both children have been asleep for half an hour and I am nackard. My body almost pulling itself to bed as I write this. Baby by the feet? Yes. Every now and then that also works.

Maybe it is I who hasn't understood that, yes, it did take all those mamas months and months and months before something was finished. Maybe I have missed crucial information like: Oh, yes my youngest is five years now, during the baby and toddler years I just slept when I could.

Or maybe it is me.
I think it is me.
I seem to be more unfocused then others I know. And I am sure my insecurities are hempering me. The fact that when I see all the beautiful things that are done by other artists here on the internet I just want to sit down and cry. Because I feel so sure that I am just kidding myself. Who would ever want to take part in what I do? How can I even think for a moment that someone is actually going to by something I drew? Ha! And where are all those wonderful projects and artpieces I keep telling myself I am going to make? I never finish anything, do I?

And so on and on.
Until I feel so heavy I can barely move my feet. Except I have to.

I know what I need to do. I know I can't worry too much about what other people think. About what I think other people think. I know I cannot wait for somebody else's approval or pat on the back. I have to support myself. Cheer myself along. Inside me sits the child, still waiting for someone to say: of course you can do it! Your art is wonderful! And so are you! I know that I am the one that child is waiting for. I just don't know how to go about it yet.

Sometimes I think I am so used to my insecurities that I'll never really do what it takes to get rid off them. Like those old ugly jumpers you don't want to wear outside the house anymore, you don't really want to wear them at all, but you don't throw them away, you toss them back into the closet because you never know what could happen, or something like that. I do throw away old clothes more than other people though. Maybe it's my subconscious trying to be funny :).

Anyways, days like this I feel so blessed to have this outside my door. I love it. I do. It is so beautiful it makes my heart cry and sing at the same time.

Trees have a spirit. I am sure of it.

Love!
Robin

The sentence I picked and how I continued it.

Today I went to the library. We had an appointment at the doctors, but had to wait for over an hour (hooray for my doctor who gives you a time estimate when you get in line!). So I took baby L across the street to have a cup of coffee at the library café and she fell asleep on the way.

In the café there was a sale of books that had been sorted out from the library and I found a book by one of my favorite authors. Naturally I bought it. I closed my eyes, flipped the pages and put my finger down on a sentence (the book is in swedish, and I wrote it in swedish, here is my attempt to translate it):

But Jenny came and sang...


She sang so the evening sky paled. The blackbird who always filled our early evenings with his homey chirrups and twirrels sat down by the rail of the verandah to listen. His black suit floated out into the dark shadows around him, but the lights from inside made his eye twinkle. His shiny eye and my dry eyes met and fell into eachother until I no longer knew who was the observer and who was the observed. The I in the tale. All that happened that evening - was it my or the blackbird's story?

The others were watching Jenny of course. Actually she was rather inconsiderable. The hair of no particular colour and her skin was sensitive and therefore filled with blushes and dry spots. The eyes were filled with some sort of light, I guess, but they weren't more beautiful than average. Besides, her lips were thin and pale. But when those lips parted, and she sang - then everybody forgot how inconsiderable she was. Like tiny lit candles they all sat turned towards her, shining. Their faces full of glow and wonder. Some were smiling. Some closed their eyes. Some cried. Only my heart closed. Filled with blackbird feathers.

Maybe it was my hatred that made her fall on the stairs. Maybe my slippery kindness found it's way under her petite shoes and made her lose foothold. I don't know. Strangely enough neither of the shoes fell of. She lay there with her skirts spred out like a fan, a growing shadow around her hair. The beautiful tiny slippers still both on their foot.


Also, I played around with my image from week two a bit. Not great, but here it is :).

Robin's Playground. Week three.

I almost didn't make it this week. I kind of didn't. I only have a sketch, almost, to show. I will have to post the finished picture later.

I imagined the lamps with dreams and thoughts pooring out of them and onto the tired woman at the bottom. Will post it when I'm finished... My children were both sick and I have had almost no sleep so I decided to go easy on myself and not stress the project. It's called Playground for a reason :).

Ok. The second week we were inspired by an image or a small piece of an image. This week, we shall do something similar, but with words. Pick a book - from your bookshelf or a friends, or at a library or wherever - randomly open it and write down the first sentence your eyes fall upon. When you have a small chunk of time, like maybe 15 minutes (or more of course), look at it again and write what ever poors into your mind. Continue the sentence like a story, or a poem, or a manifesto :). If you feel called to draw something as a continuation to the sentence - do so! That would be wonderful as well.

I am sorry if this post is a bit on the short side. I really, reeaaalllly need to go to sleep :).

I leave you with the best hairdo ever (just woke up):

Love!

walking barefoot.

A time of transition.
The dead has yet to disappear into the earth. The living has just made it's way through it.
I will do my best to walk tall through it and explore the gifts it carries.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pzCLnaIOHOA&feature=youtu.be

Love!

seven years.

Notebooks filled to the brim. Kept in boxes for a while. By my bed for a while. In the basement and most recently in a bookshelf. Seven years of something I felt I absolutely had to hold on to. Something probalby invaluable.

 

Today I looked to see what there was that was so necessary to keep. Page up and down with draining negative thoughts. List after list of how I ought to improve myself and my life. Boring notes from boring classes at the university. I mean, really. Robin, really.  

And so I lit a candle, paused to gather and center myself. And then I started ripping. I did find a few things I want to keep. Scraps of words. Hastily jotted down ideas of images or songs. Those, I shall keep. The rest - into the fire.

It is so easy to be held back by the past. I sure have been for so long. I know there is a lot I need to let go of in order to be free. And I have refused to do anything about it. Partly because one of the things (paradoxically) I need to let go of is the idea of myself as living my life as an artist. In the sence you can do when you are twenty something. Letting art always come first. Have all the time in the world to explore and evolve. Work late hours at the theatre. Live on lettuce for a month. It is not going to happen. I didn't become the at least rather good actress I know I could have been. I didn't become the singer and songwriter I know lives in my heart somewhere. I didn't go to London to live a wilder life for a couple of years. I didn't travel the world to collect stories. And I am probably not going to do those things either. I need to let go of those dreams, grieve them. They only prevent me from being the person and artist I am now. It is scary to let go of something that you have treasured for so long. And trust that what rises from the ashes can also be great. And more true to what I am today.

What do you have to let go of in order to be true to who you are today?

Love!

Robin's Playground. Week two.

This week has passed so fast I can hardly believe it is time for me to hand out (and do). I wanted to get the video working for this week, but I am just going to have to accept that I don't have the time for anything else than the absolutely necessary right now. And that does not entail swearing over machines I don't know how to work :). Hopefully I'll figure it out further ahead along the way.

Anyways.... I hope you had fun creating your hands. I saw a lovely example of what one of you have been doing on my facebook page, and it filled my heart with joy. I got plenty of more ideas of what I want to do with the theme, but now it is surely time that I present the next theme:

Elaborate! Maybe that is a good name for it. I'm not sure. What you do is this: cut out a picture or a small piece of a picture. Glue onto a piece of paper (or onto something else if you would rather make the image on something other than paper). Elaborate = use the picture as a part of your own picture. Be inspired by it. What could it be? What happens around it? I don't really know of a way to do this with words, but if you do - feel free to do it =).

I am now going to post a crappy example of what I am talking about. I think these "instruction examples" are all going to be like that. Made in the last minute. Taking no more than a minute. Good for my impro skills! Here it is:

Ok I got carried away. Maybe a little bit more than a minute. More like ten. Just like last week I will post what I do as soon as it is finished. Feel free to post on the facebookpage or on flickr! Thank you so much for being here.

Love!

mornings.

I think we've got a nice little morning routine going. If I can just keep the stress at bay that is. We get up, not too early, not too late. I make myself some coffee and then we play, put the clothes on and have breakfast. Not  in order, not very orderly. Quite messy and often with some sort of powerstruggle, but still nice and easy. Cosy. Every now and then I have a meltdown while trying to put outdoor clothes on two struggling ones. But I'm working on that part.

As soon as we get outside it's all sunshine. No matter what the weather. I so much love the outdoors. And I am so happy to see that so do my children. And now that spring truly is here it's all the more lovely. Even though we live in a city, I do feel that I can get in touch with nature. After I have left S at daycare, I venture in the parks with L. (Even small parks can be adventures for small children. So much to touch and look at and smell and eat! :)).

Love!