The Story of The Muse

Commissioned portrait for a couple's wedding. Oil on stretched canvas (2023).

It’s 7:20PM on a Saturday evening. I’ve returned home from a long and exciting day out in Charlotte, North Carolina. I visited the Charlotte Museum of Modern Art with my partner, and attended the St Patrick’s day parade and artist market.

I created a watercolor painting from life with the market bustling around me, live music blaring in my ears. (Thank you, little earplugs I carry around at all times.) I had an absolutely dream of a day. I felt alive in the fullness of my artist self. So connected. Living in my truth.

It created a question mark in my head, and I thought of a story which I want to tell you. If you’re a perfectionist, (especially if you’re a perfectionist and an artist), you’ll probably need to hear this the same way that I did.

Let me tell you a story about The Muse.

How often have you felt that paralyzing feeling that stops you from doing something that excites you? Let me paint you a picture. 

A thought pops into your head. We’ll call this thought The Muse.

The Muse says:

"What if. . . I create that painting?"

"What if. . .  I write that story?"

"What if. . . I SHARE that story?"

"What if. .  . I publish something important to me?"

When The Muse whispers to you, you feel a great surge energy that burns from your toes to the top of your head. You feel excitement. You want to begin.

You gather the materials, maybe even spend tons of money on equipment to do that thing you’re passionate about. You’re ready to begin, and the first stroke of pencil on paper, you’re beyond elated. You’re in a flow state. You start creating the project you’re so, so passionate about. . . Then your energy is stopped by what feels like a thick, brick, unmovable wall.

"I don’t like it," you think. "This is not any good. What will others think of me if I show them this? What do I think of myself?"

Reader. Oil on stretched canvas (2023)

Comparison creeps in, and you hold your artwork up to someone else’s. Wow, you think, others do it better.

The energy slowly dwindles and seeps away like sand through your fingers. Maybe creating what you love was never meant for you. Maybe creating such things were meant for more competent, more skilled hands than you possess. 

The next day, week, month– the thought returns. What if I create something new? You try. You fail. You stop. 

"What if?"

You try. You fail. You stop. The cycle repeats.

You take a step back. You do the safe thing. You find ways to spend your time where you won’t have to face challenge, face disappointment. You limit yourself, you limit your capacity for growth, to continue coasting in the safe area of your mind where you feel “good enough.” You’re not doing what you love, you’re doing what you can tolerate, and what gains approval and appreciation from others. You say this is “good enough.”

The only problem with “good enough,” is that if you let yourself, you’ll stay there for years. You will go through the motions, spend your time on what you can tolerate which brings you comfort to avoid doing what you love and facing the reality that you might fail. Before you can blink, years will have passed, and you’re lying there on the floor, asleep. You will constantly wonder what would happen one day if you let yourself go and do everything you ever dreamed of doing. Be who you dreamt of being. Instead, you lie on the floor, thinking of it instead of being it. Thinking of it feels safe. Being it feels frightening.

"What if. . ?"

The Muse will never go away, as much as you try to move on from it. 

When you settle for being “good enough,” you reject the truth The Muse asks you to become. “Good enough” is the lie that makes you feel safe, but keeps you in constant discomfort.

"What if, what if, what if. . ?"

The Muse doesn’t go away.

Here you sit, best friends with comparison and self doubt. What the world doesn’t tell you is that you are comparing your first, second, third attempt to someone else’s 501st attempt. They just didn’t advertise attempt 1 through 500. 

We all put our best foot forward. We all put the mask on that looks the best to others. We show others our highlight reel, and then compare our outtakes, our reject roll,  to others' best day performance.
​
We are all born with something different to offer. Why do we expend so much energy trying to be exactly like everyone else? Why do we chase the idea of success that someone else tells us is real but could be fake, when we could be cultivating what feels true to us?

The answer is because it’s hard. 

When we start out, we stumble, shake, and fall. And to avoid the trying, to avoid the thought of failing, we stay there, lying on the ground, asleep, with The Muse whispering to us every now and then.

"What if. . . What if . . . What if . . ?"

Self doubt finishes: What if I fail?

The Muse says: What if. . .

Self doubt finishes: What if everyone watches me put myself out there, struggle to become who I WANT to be, laughs at me, says “I told you so,” and walks away from me?

The Muse says: What if. . . 

Self doubt, having said its piece, is finally quiet enough to allow The Muse to finish.

The Muse says: What if. . .

. . .

You are everything that you want to be already. . ?

. . .

Like the seed of a flower. . .

You are under the soil…

Unable to see the petals when you bloom. . .

Study of hand with flower. Acrylic on canvas (2016).

The thing is: self doubt is loud, like a blaring street siren. It is distracting, feels urgent, and at times it feels dangerous. You worry that if you don't listen to the warning bells, those blaring sirens, that something bad will happen.

​In comparison, The Muse is quiet and subtle. Unrelenting like a river’s current. If you step in the water, it feels gentle and inconsequential, yet it provides the source of life to those around it. It is strong and persistent, and can round a rough rock into a smooth pebble, should you give it time.

So here’s the story of The Muse.

​Give it time.