In the Beginning

It is not always easy to sit down with a blank anything (paper, canvas, screen).  The possibilities are endless...but where to begin.  Oh I have been told many ways to start but it has never been easy for me because I feel that there is not one right way or place to start and I tend to get overwhelmed and just don't start at all.  What a shame when you think about it, endless possibilities and I am paralyzed by that!  That my dear friends is a Spiritual problem.  One I work on on a daily basis.  "How?" You may ask, and I would be glad to tell you, by starting...simple things one by one, one day at a time.  If I feel myself feeling a leading towards something, or feeling regretful about not having done something I head towards it.  

"Starting" has put a paintbrush back in my hand, has lead me to piano lessons and has lead me me towards a vocational path I could have never imagined.  "Starting" is so much scarier for me then it sounds, I have felt that I have lived a life based on staying still, staying quiet, behaving in a manor that draws as little attention to one's self as possible, keeping the canvas of life blank for fear of "messing it up" the problem is, what if you get to the end of this life with a still blank canvas? You have lived a life paralyzed by possibilities, and you in the end have nothing but a clean, safe, boring, uninspired life to show for it.  

So PAINT ON YOUR CANVAS!!!! So WHAT if you mess it up, you can learn from that and paint over it!!! There have been x rays done of old master paintings that show them having painted over one masterpiece to create another, totally different one.  VanGogh painted over a portrait of a woman to create a painting called "a patch of grass".  Have you ever covered over one layer of life to create another totally different layer of life that is just as beautiful but totally different from the one before it? Maybe when you passed from childhood to adulthood?  From Parenthood into a life with Independent Children? Or from a darker time in life into a life that feels more filled with light?  Our canvases can hold far more then we think as we stand before the pristine-ness of blank white and the layers we create do nothing but add depth and texture to the life that we create...in the Creator's image.