Tuesday, July 28, 2009

Yesterday Paul & I started a new art class at Turing Point. We have heard former participants rave about how wonderful this class is and we have seen the amazing progress of the paintings several times so we are excited to finally be taking the class. Last night was an introductory session. In order to take this class you have to have metastatic cancer and be a family member or close friend of the participant with metastatic cancer so it is nice to be with a group of people who are sharing the same experiences and who get it. Both facilitators are cancer survivors one of pancreatic cancer which is very cool for us to know. Part of the class is about writing and part about painting. The facilitators are really cool people. The painter is a college professor. He gave a talk to us last night that I wish I could have recorded. We both related to it and thought of many people that we know who would be able too as well. He was talking about how we are either creative thinkers or critical thinkers, right brained or left and the consequences of giving up or being a creative thinker in a critical thinking world. He says art is our birthright and so is being a creative thinker. It is debilitating in all ways to shut down that part of yourself b/c it is who you are and how you learn,live,respond. Why do some artists become alcoholics...b/c supporting that side of a person is not what society does and the pressures and expectations of a critical thinking world are suppressing. An example I thought of from my experience is that I never focused on college as a means to a job. That was not why I was there. I wanted to further my education...broaden my horizons if you prefer. My degree is in English on the writing track with a minor in philosophy. I also took several art classes. I remember being asked and having the comment sarcastically thrown at me "What are you going to do with an English degree?" Add a philosophy minor and people really snickered. I was and am very proud of my choices. If I would have studied marketing I would have been miserable and a marketing job was not and is not my idea of something I want to do. Plus, in my opinion, in your early 20's you have no idea what you want to do with yourself and it is usually not the thinking that you can't wait to graduate so you can sit behind a desk all day and toil away for your future endeavors. We still want to be free, to learn, to explore, to have adventure, we haven't yet had real world reality hit us over the head. When it does we tend to give up a side of ourselves that doesn't seem rational or logical anymore but why? Why do we do this? That is what I want to know. I still want to learn,explore, be free, have adventure and I am sure I am not alone. I silenced my creative thinker for a period of time and I almost died,really.

Eleanor Roosevelt put it best when she said "The future belongs to those who believe in the beauty of their dreams." Dreams should never be given up that is what fuels us to grow and attain personal achievements. We want to fulfill our dreams.

Keep on dreaming and unleash that creative thinker.

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