A small shift, perhaps
I don’t know what kind of flowers these are
But the effort feels monumental.
It’s taken a lot to finally create this post: courage, humility, and dispelling falsehoods. It’s taken finding the ability to harness motivation as it lie among the temptations of deeply ingrained procrastination habits. And it took all those things in spite of not only the mental challenges, but also those I physically (virtually?) faced to get here. The research on which website builder to use, the conflict over picking a template, converting my photos from Apple’s proprietary .HEIC to .jpeg in order to actually be able to open them on my computer and upload them to f***ing website.
Can you tell which part of that I struggled with the most?
For a long time, I’ve dreamt of exploring my creative interests more deeply, but haven’t allowed myself to put forth the effort to do so. That’s not to say I haven’t done anything creative in recent years. In fact, recent years are the ones where I’ve actually realized I might have a creative bone in my body. I have made a couple videos here and there - some uploaded, others unfinished - and I have taken many pictures on my phone to share with friends, family, Instagram and myself. However, I think I’ve scratched only the surface of these interests.
Actually, I know it. There is much to be discovered here. I want to see where these interests can take me. I want more out of my creative mind, and less out of my worrisome one. My creative mind, I think, is one full of hope and discovery. It’s vibrant and curious - emotional and caring. It’s what makes me unique. In contrast, my worrisome mind is full of anxieties orbiting fears of failure, rejection, and change. It holds me back with lies and “what ifs.” What if nobody cares about what I create? What if I get made fun or ostracized? What if I end up worse off than when I started?
What if I don’t?
What if people do care? What if people sing me praises rather than criticisms? What if all those things I’ve feared can be embraced at the same time? Perhaps failure and rejection are really just necessary steps towards improvement. Maybe change can be scary while at the same time being objectively good.
For a long time, I’ve dreamt of exploring my creative interests more deeply, and it’s time I put forth the effort to do so.
Anyways, enjoy these pictures I took yesterday of some bees and flowers.
