So You Want to be an Artist?: Boundaries and Organization I

 When we consider the scenario of our artist from the last blog I offered, we see that our artist may have issues with boundaries . In other words, because she didn’t take herself seriously, perhaps she allowed other things to infringe on her artistic endeavors.

 Consider this: what if our artist had been, instead, a worker at Wal-mart or a receptionist in an office, not to mention an attorney or doctor. I doubt that the sister would have even asked our artist to watch her kids. Not that watching kids in a pinch is a bad thing, but there is a prevailing sentiment that a person who professes to be an artist is, basically, unemployed and has loads of free time to pick up the slack for others. This is especially true of other family members.

 For example, I have certain family members and friends that assume that, because I am an artist and also run two other businesses, I have all this free time to run errands for them or deliver messages to others or sit and chat on the phone. It is not that they consciously make a decision to think my time is less valuable- they simply don’t think about it. They assume that since I am my own boss, my time is very flexible and theirs isn’t. This is not a true reality, but it is a perceived reality from their perspective. The reality is, I have a full time “day job” doing bookkeeping for a friend, I co-run my own non-art company with my husband, I run my art business, I am a wife and hockey mom, and I also teach very in-depth Bible studies and host group meetings every Friday night and some Saturdays. Around all this I find time to paint and write. My time is a whole lot more valuable than that of many of the people who assume I do nothing!

 So, back to our artist- she decided to help her sister out. That was admirable, but what was not admirable is that she allowed the babysitting to derail her whole day, and this leads to another point: Artists often tend to have lots of creativity, but they also tend to lack self discipline and organization. Our artist could have done some things differently and could have accomplished both the babysitting and something that was art-centric as well. Let’s go through her day as I would have handled it.

 First, I am a “morning person” and the best I have to offer creatively occurs between 6:30 and noon. After that, I am able to work on things that are in progress or do marketing effectively, but it is not the best time to start a new painting or sketch out ideas as a general rule. So, I would have definitely saved the paint sorting our artist did first thing in the morning for an afternoon project, and I would have gotten at least an extra 20 minutes to work on something creative.

 Okay, so now I get the phone call about the kids while I am involved in my sketching- and of course I offer my assistance to my sister since I am a nice person and see her dilemma. I also mention that I need to get away to take some reference photos in the near future, so perhaps she could watch my kids while I go on a day long road trip in the next two weeks or so. Of course, I am bailing her out today, so she agrees. Now, with this I did not gain any time today, but I did gain a whole day in the near future, so it was a trade off. Now- what to do with the kids while I try to get something done artistically…

 I decide to make a “play tent” in my living room for them, with lots of pillows and cushy things from which they can see the TV, which I plan to use as entertainment for them for several hours. (Of course, using the TV as a surrogate sitter frequently is not a good idea, but today the kids are sick and I have things to do. ) I also pull out some carrots, celery, onion, garlic, frozen pepper stir fry, and chicken and put on chicken soup for lunch. I have a quick, easy recipe that I have used so much it is second nature to make, and I will make enough to extend to dinner also, and so kill two birds with one stone. Before I know it, the sick children arrive, complete with whimpering and soulful glances from their mom to me.

 Once I get them arranged, I pull out my computer and move to the living room with the kids. I frequently use the computer for sketching and painting when I don’t have time or space to pull out and clean up lots of art supplies, or when I am too ill to work with regular supplies. ( I have chronic health issues from the cancer, so some days are just better than others) I have found it to be an indispensable part of my hectic life, because without it, I could not do half of what I do artistically. I can sketch there, view photos there, and actually paint there, and as long as I click “save” I can jump up at a moment’s notice and take care of life’s little issues, like laundry or spilled milk, and then come back and get right back to it. I don’t have to worry about fumes, set up, clean up, spilled paint, the doorbell ringing in the middle of applying a watercolor wash, or whatever.

 So the bottom line is this: instead of spending my day working with my oils, I compromise and get a couple of promising sketches done, which I can either continue to paint in the computer, or print out and transfer to canvas or paper. I also work on my blog and some postcard mailers for an upcoming show. Then, in the afternoon, I play some board games with the kids, and after their nap we decide to make a few cookies- the refrigerated kind you just bake and serve. Granted it wasn’t what I wanted to do, but it was a step or two in the right direction, nonetheless, and tomorrow is another day.Plus I got a free road trip day in the bargain!

 So as you can see, we need to decide whether we are going to let life completely derail us, or whether we are simply going to take a detour. The detour is not where we wanted to go, but it will still get us to the same destination eventually. We also have to begin to think about boundaries- setting up roadblocks and fences to redirect others who would rob us of our precious creativity.