What lights you up?

I’m a big fan of Nicholas Wilton’s Art 2 Life podcast. I want to share with you some of the points he made in the recent episode entitled “Following the Trail of Art”.

Finding your way

“She will find her way as long as she finds something that brings her alive. Everything else is connected to that. It doesn’t matter what the thing is.”

His father said to Nicholas when he was a 14 year old boy “I will be really disappointed in you Nick if you don’t try a million things and find what you love.” Nick acknowledges that that is probably the single best piece of parenting advise. He relays how it was so liberating to be given permission to find the thing that lights you up because then your child can find their way. This is what brings out the gifts in everyone.

“It’s a fire that we need to cultivate in ourselves”

Community

“We can’t know ourselves without the reflection of ourselves through others… We all need to be seen, to be felt and to be heard. … we normally feel the most connected to ourselves when we are in relationship with someone who really, really sees you… it gives you momentum, especially in art.”

An artful life

Nicholas urges us to focus on the making of art, not the result. He talks about the difference between thinking about making art v Making art

He observes that making art is rarely stressful. Thinking about it can be.

When you are making art, you get to be totally free.

The win in creativity is in the making of art. He likens it to drinking wine … you can just guzzle it or you can cleanse the palate, smell it, taste it with small sips, really appreciate it. In a similar way he encourages us when making art to focus on how it makes you feel, to observe what’s happening with the colours, all the nuances, all the richness, what your practice is teaching you over a series of artworks. As opposed to the result. When you are making art it brings you into the present, into a state of mindfulness. The joy of actually making something. It sustains you. “Art making is a process of becoming yourself”. That’s what you’re making… you’re making you. You’re getting more sensitive, more alive, more present, your relationships get deeper and yes there is some evidence of it.. the pieces of art behind you. “There is an artful way to live.”

The higher you climb the better you can see the way to the top

When you start to make something, there’s a certain potency that allows you to make better decisions the further you go. But you have to begin. We are hard wired to want to know how something is going to come out but the wonder and the curiosity come out of the darkness. You can never plan the incredible. Just get going and get in motion. We are better able to make decisions about where we are going because of where we have been. When we get breakthroughs it’s like getting on top of a mountain pass... you suddenly have clarity and hopefulness. You suddenly get a sense of where you are going.

Changing the pace makes something easier or harder and you can accomplish anything if you just change the pace. So if you haven’t done something before, take small steps often.

Artmaking involves three things. Our minds, our bodies and our soul.

The mind… planning it, thinking about it, judging it.. is the thing we use most but it’s the least useful.

When he teaches, Nicholas urges his students to do more of the stuff that makes them feel good. By contrast, if its feeling tight and constrained then you have to change that. When we are in the right state, when we are feeling more like ourselves, when we are not just in our head and we are using our intuition that’s our perfect state of being. When we make art from that place the art feels like that and it is art that people can connect to.

The soul is the voice of intuition. The deeper sense, the deeper knowing. It is truthful, never lies, it doesn’t have an ego and it’s always right. It doesn’t clamour for attention. It won’t bother you unless you want to pay attention to it but it’s the key to everything.

The way into the soul is the body. Just go and dance. Go crazy and make your art. When you are in that state you are better equipped to hear and feel and sense what it is that is important to you.

Play is the way in

Playing is doing whatever feels good. Kids in a playground are just making stuff up. You are following what interests you. What lights you up. When you play you discover the things that move you. That’s how they come in… not through struggle and force.

The soul comes through when the door is left open, when we are at ease, when we are more ourselves. That’s what we are when we are playing. This is the best version of ourselves. You can’t plan play.

As Picasso is quoted as saying “All children are artists. The problem is how to remain an artist once you grow up.”