Julia Cameron

Unconscious Resistance, maybe

When I had to order a book for bookclub, I couldn't think of what other book I wanted.  It seemed like there was one I needed to get or wanted to get or both, but I couldn't think of it, so I ordered Jincy Willet's "The Writing Class" in addition to "Mariette in Ecstacy" by Ron Hansen which is the bookclub selection for next time.  The next day I realized that what I should have ordered was "The Vein of Gold" for Artist's Way group for next month by Julia Cameron.  That's weird. Am I resisting getting started with "Vein of Gold"?

Another weird note. I just finished reading "Julie and Julia" after seeing the movie by the same name. It's written by Julie Powell and is about her blogging her way into a book contract by cooking all of the recipes in Julia Child's "Mastering The Art Of French Cooking" in one year.  Both women had genius ideas and then I suddenly realized that Julia Cameron was yet another Julia and I felt doomed because I wasn't a Julia and was therefore relegated to the ranks of the less than genius ordinary.  or below ordinary as in stultifyingly ordinary. Sigh.

Theories

I've told you how The Artist's Way came into my life, but I didn't tell you about my theory as to why it came into my life. In 1990 I went to a shrink for the first time. I just sort of felt like life was blah and I was unhappy. I didn't know what to do about it. I was reluctant to go to a shrink before that because, well, there was nothing really wrong with my life. I mean nothing catastrophic, nothing that every other person on the planet was complaining about or trying to improve.  But then one day I found out that a friend whom I thought had it all together, revealed that she was going to a shrink and was on Prozac.  I was stunned. This woman was someone I admired. She was part owner of a successful business and took art classes and traveled to places like Africa.  Finding out that she thought she needed help allowed me to seek help. Luckily I ended up with a Jungian. At the time, I had heard of Jung, but all I knew was what I was taught in college psych classes, that he was a disciple of Freud's.  Later, I found out about his theory of the collective unconscious and felt cheated that his theories weren't more widely taught in place of Freud's, because for my money, his made way more sense.  It was an aha moment.

But I digress. The first thing the shrink asked me was what I wanted. Like really deep down, what did I want. It shouldn't be a tough question, but it was. I went to see Dr. Green for less than a year, but because of his counseling I asked for a raise for the first time in my life and I got it.  Then I bought a house and I couldn't afford to continue the process with him. But I was well on my way.  It felt like doors were opening just a crack. Somehow I think questioning myself and trying new things like asking for a raise and buying a house, paved the way for The Artist's Way to come to me. When the student is ready, the teacher will appear.  Something like that.

Okay New Deadline for Major Breakthroughs

Yesterday I said that by 2012 I will have been working with The Artist's Way for 20 years.  Well, I was wrong.  I was thinking of the year the book was published, not when I first laid hands on it. So I have until 2014 to get that GREAT AMERICAN NOVEL published. Hoorah!  I guess I got caught up in all the Mayan Calendar end of the world stuff.  But if the world ends, I guess I'm off the hook for the novel, eh.  I have 4 years and 3 months to get it done. I can't decide if I'm relaxed because I have two more years than I thought yesterday or if I'm nervous with just the idea of putting a deadline to it. Yikers, batman?!

Reality Check

I just realized from my last posting that in 2012, it will be my 20th anniversary with The Artist's Way, not to mention the end of the world according to the Mayan calendar.  Wow!  20 years.  It was slow going at first. I'd take an art workshop or a class on Feng Shui every now and then when I was still struggling to even make it through the book once. I will say that even if I got stymied at Chapter 4, I would keep journaling (maybe not every day and not 3 pages - but still journaling).  I also did artist dates. Once again not every week, but I kept going because it felt good and it felt like I was doing something.  I also started giving people a copy of The Artist's Way.  I tried to do that once or twice a year and I have continued that practice to this day.  I gave my friend and former roomie, Chris Justice The Artist's Way for his going away present when he decided to be a river guide.  Someone at the going away party introduced me to a woman named Kay who was looking for an Artist's Way group, but couldn't join her friend's group because they only allowed quilters in their group.  When I talked to Kay, I found out that she was a jeweler, but a jeweler who wanted to write.  She was more interested in writing at that point than doing the Artist's Way.  I had at that point been in a writing group with a friend from Boise Weekly, Rachel. But that only lasted two meetings. Kay and I decided to start a writing group.  Because of being in that writing group, and even after that one blew up, being in other writing groups, I have 2 honorable mentions in the Boise Weekly Fiction 101 (disclaimer - I entered the contest after I had left the Boise Weekly three years previously and it had been sold twice AND at the point where no one I had worked with was working there any longer).  I also have now had 6 magazine articles published, and now write for Examiner.com.  In addition I've done NaNoWriMo 5 times and made it to 50,000 words 3 times out of the 5.  I never would have done any of that if it hadn't been for The Artist's Way. Do I want to do more? Yes. 

I'm not even mentioning taking a painting class for several years, or sticking my toe in some tentative steps toward eventually, I hope, film.  But there you have it.  Considering that I've been laid off three times, and have switched jobs 7 times and now work two jobs, neither of which have paid leave time, I think I'm doing pretty good. There's always room for improvement and just thinking about coming up on twenty years soon has got my inner goal bitch all up in my grill. I gotta get with it, man!

History Part Two

My first attempts at doing "The Artist's Way" were solo and failed.  I tried it three or four times and got stopped at Chapter 4.  Repeatedly. This is the chapter where you give up reading for a week.  Tough one. I am a big reader and even though I know I use reading to escape, I could not give it up completely. Later on I also thought on some level that I really didn't want to complete the book. I wanted it to go on and on.  At some point, even though I found the appendix with the list of books for further reading, I didn't believe that I would find a book as cool as TAW.  Also I had the idea that I needed to do the book perfectly. If I didn't do each chapter perfectly then I needed to start over.
"The Artist's Way" touched me and I knew deep down that I was on the right path to be attempting the program in the book.  I cried reading the first chapter when there was a quote that said that the worst thing - I'm paraphrasing here- that one could visit upon one's children was the unlived life of the parent.  And then the part about shadow artists killed me.  I was always going to friends' art openings and never even thinking I was even close to being an artist.  I was thrilled by the possibility of TAW, but I was very apprehensive of telling anyone that I had the audacity to be doing it.  It was my secret while I grappled with the idea that maybe just maybe, I was an artist. The other really funny thing I did was buy the smallest notebook EVER to do the morning pages.  It was about the size of a Moleskine and it took me about an hour or two to fill up three pages.  Now that's funny. I can write three pages in no time nowadays.  Back then I would find myself staring off into space for large swathes of time while trying to get those pages written.