determination

On one side are real tangeable goals, something you can touch and see. On the other side are ideals, ideas, dreams, wishes, desires. I live mostly on the dream side. I am trying to move toward the reality side. So this week I did a word study to draw my mental energy into this process. Still dreaming? Probably. But it helps me to think on paper. And if I get a better grip on what the difference is, I hope it will prepare me to act more decisively. Hope. Learn. See those words? Dream side of things, they are. But prepare and act, those are on the goal side of things.

Determination: I thought about the fact that I am a "flaming P". (ok, this is from the Meyers-Briggs types, P is the letter a person comes out with if she likes to keep her options open as long as possible, does not want to commit.) I suppose I get this from my Dad. When they asked him to work at AUL, the guy thought the phone had gone dead because of the long silence. Daddy would not go, Uh, um, hmmm, let me see, he would just be quiet while his brain wheels turned slowly. Whatever came out would be a good decision, but you had to wait for it.

A flaming P wants to keep her options open as long as possible. Another way of putting it is that she is afraid to commit and get stuck. Up to now, I have not made that determination: ‘I am going to do this thing’. My coach said he would fail as a coach if I never took a step toward making my life purpose a reality.

I have grown to like the song on 'Awaken' CD by Natalie Grant, the last song which she sings with Wynona Judd. He’s gonna bring it all together for good. He’s gonna make you happy. He’s gonna make you laugh out loud. Yes, it’s true, God is ultimately in control of the outcome, whether my dream comes true or not. But that does not mean that I should just wait for it to come together, piddling around without a goal. I can make a specific goal and work towards it...

My entrepreneur friend is willing and happy to have lunch with me so that I can pick her brain. She is a go getter, a plan an doer and she has come all the way from sick and broke with an injured and broke husband to owning homes and having successful businesses and she is not finished by a long shot. She says it's a God thing, and it is, but I still want to be around her and learn how she works.

So my "reason" for not being determined is that I’m afraid that if I invest money in making a career painting and writing, I will lose in the end and wind up broke, or at best struggling financially.

Why don’t I believe I can be a NOT starving artist? My coach gave me a lot of ammunition to believe with and he said “you will say he’s just saying that because he’s my coach” and he is partly right, but no, I do believe I am marketable. So do I need to make a goal and be one of those crazy people who puts signs up all over the house and car about what my goal is?
determination n. = firmness of purpose
focus = a center of activity or interest v.
3. to concentrate or be concentrated or directed (on a center etc)

I think I've been taking steps toward a goal, by saying yes to things that pertain to art, writing and people (life coaching) but those are just areas not goals they are too big, too nebulous, too braod the target is not pin pointed.

Speakimg of nebulous, when I went out for our walk tonight the clouds were cumulous, big, warm and stormy looking, not warm in color, they were mostly deep blues, but the weekend brought warm weather and they seemed warm. I tied my jacket around my waste half way down the street. It seems like winter is over so suddenly and that in a couple weeks all the trees will be budding. Already some are dressing up with reddish purple.

The big heavy clouds were moving slightly. They dropped a little rain on us as we walked, but not enough to make us wet. I turned my ankle and thought Oh no not again! but decided it was the pain-for-one-minute variety and walked home, and even ran part of the way and it did not hurt. The last thing I need is to be injured at work tomorrow when we are being reviewed and they asked me to come in for the morning shift so that if they ask me security questions, they will get a good answer. The new person might not know the answers, and the old person may know some of the answers but never comes in on time and won't be there whent they come through.

I met the guy who is building an arts community South of here. I had read about him in the newspaper's Sunday magazine and made a mental note that I should check it out. Well, they paged him in my store and I thought, hey, that's that guy in the magazine.

I call up to the department to which he'd been paged and say: ask him if he would stop by the entrance on his way out, I want to meet him. After about 10 minutes I see a guy going upstairs and I think it is he, but I don't chase him because I'm not sure... meanwhile a rumor has started in the department to which he was called that he's some famous person, because Annie said he was in the magazine this week.

Well, they call back and want to know who he is and is he famous? and they say that he just ordered something and went downstairs. So I go looking. Hmmm, I think he's the type to just make his purchase and leave; he's not going to browse; I think I'll go down to where he will be picking up his order.

Sure enough there he is and I introduce myself and ask him about his project and tell him I'm interested, that I'm starting to paint again after 35 years of mothering and ministering. He is renovating a place where artists can live and work all in one place. It sounds cool. I ask about a waiting list, yes, he expects there will be one and he gives me his email address. He says he's gotten more responses from that article than any previous ones about similar projects in other cities. He is wearing the same jacket he was photographed in. He is an architect.

In a few years time, when his project is up and running, I may be ready to sell my house. My girls will be out on their own I hope. I may want a small artist's apartment then. Hmmm, I do not know if this is something the Lord put in my lap or not. The little red brick storybook house, (see post "love at first sight") was not for me, but it still had a reason for me to look at it.

Oh yes, this is supposed to be about determination, and yet I am allowing myself to free write, so now I need to determine that I am going to make a living painting and writing. Why do I feel the need to be so darn sure before I jump in? Is it because I felt sure before, and jumped in, and in the end did not feel I succeeded in my first career? Success breeds success. (So does a sense of failure breed failure)

I did not feel successful then, even though my outlook on all of what I did has changed and I value it for what it was: me trying, struggling along while depressed. I think I am way over the line guarded against failure. It comes back to what I am learning about fear, a perfectionism, and all that. To be continued, I have to go to work.