"WINGED OWL" 

by Laura Basha, 2015

WE’RE ALWAYS AT “SQUARE ONE”

Years ago when I was a freshman in undergraduate school beginning my BA in Fine Arts, I had a drawing teacher who had “favorites” in the class. He tended to play up to the most talented students. I was very insecure at the time about my ability to draw, as I had had no instruction growing up. I was not one of his favorites.

We had a drawing assignment to draw a self portrait, and I was anxious about doing the work. When the assignment was due, he had all the students lay out their drawings on a large table and picked them up one by one, “critiquing” each one. When he came to mine, he held it up and looked at it, and as he tossed it over his shoulder onto the floor behind him he said, “This does nothing for me!”, and proceeded to continue with the next student’s self portrait.

I decided at that moment, that I was no good at the thing I loved the most: Art.

Fifteen years ago I began to re-enter the field, wondering if art would reveal itself to be a hobby or a more committed passion. I now have an art studio in downtown Oakland, and we are currently turning the basement into an art studio at home … so, passion it is! I can see the skill sets developing and my enjoyment and inspiration rejuvenating me every time I immerse myself in the painter’s creative process. I look forward with joy at returning to the piece I am working on - a true privilege and sacred experience. My concern now is not whether or not it “does something” for another, but whether or not it inspires and fulfills me. Freedom!

So two weeks ago I was sitting in a critique in my current art class, in which I enrolled to motivate me to start another painting after a short dry spell. The artists in the class are essentially very nice people, the teacher - inspiring. When it came to my painting, there was a great deal of positive feedback. Then the male artist sitting next to me, probably 2 feet away, said: “She needs to decide whether that top feather is going to go off the top of the canvas or not. And it needs to be off!”.

Now, here’s the thing. With all my psych experience and training, I knew this guy was arrogant and righteous, and so covering over a lot of underlying insecurity. I was fine through the rest of the class, albeit taken aback being spoken of in the third person. However, when I got home, this creeping sensation of shrinking enveloped me from the inside out. The next morning, the joy I had been feeling to go to the studio evaporated, and I didn’t go. I couldn’t remember any of the positive comments from other class members. I was triggered again: “This does nothing for me!” emerged after 40 years.

What I can now see, as I have since gone back to the studio and regained alignment with my own inner Muse, and finished the painting of the owl, is that we are all very fragile as we work our way towards authenticity and freedom in self expression, and there is always room to grow and learn and expand the clarity of self-value that can dissolve those old patterns of limitation. We climb a mountaintop and exhale at the thrill and satisfaction and relief of reaching the top, and then we look up. And we see the next mountaintop that was previously obscured from our view.

We are always at Square One, yet as we expand our understanding, we are at Square One with deeper wisdom, compassion, resilience, and capacity to transform into who we dream we can be.