My Rediscovery of Me

One day I woke up and I was unrecognizable to myself. I couldn’t remember the last time I had written a poem that I enjoyed reading or the last time I drew a picture worth keeping. I tried to think of the last time I had taken my camera out just to capture a nice photograph – and I failed.

It scared me. My life was once overflowing with creativity. I had scrapbooks and journals full of my thoughts, my art and my life. I had rooms cluttered with markers, paintbrushes, scraps of paper and imagination. I realized that my space had become filled with emptiness – mindless thoughts and the growl of the television.

It’s unclear to me how long ago I had lost myself, but I began mourning who I was. After days of sulking and grieving, I pulled out a notepad, tore out a sheet of paper and wrote “Goals” at the top of it.

Here is some of that list:

-Get on a better schedule
-Do one creative thing each week
-Write letters
-Call home
-Spend at least 10 minutes of playtime with each cat daily
-Make one thing with the sewing machine
-Eat well

My “goals” varied in specificity and in practicality. Getting on a better schedule has always been a desire of mine, but it has never happened and I didn’t really see that changing. Eating well was a little out there as well, because I’m a lacto-ovo vegetarian who loves pizza, tortilla chips and high-calorie lattes. But doing one creative thing a week seemed like an achievable goal for me. So did the required playtime with my three kitties. (Mostly because it was something I already did.)

Three weeks later, I had doodled a flower in my sketchbook and made a window-covering out of an old dress. I hadn’t called home or improved my schedule. I was going out more and often missed the 10 minutes of uninterrupted playtime. My list was resting on a bookshelf, untouched since it was first written.

I was a mess. I convinced myself that I was hopeless, that I was doomed to a dull life of routine and to a perpetual state of monochromatic existence.

This blog is my attempt to prove myself wrong. This is me trying to appreciate the art in my life and to find the art within myself, which – I hope – will lead to my rediscovery of me.