“An artist must have downtime, time to do nothing. Defending our right to such time takes courage, conviction, and resiliency. Such time, space and quite will strike our family and friends as a withdrawal from them. IT IS! For an artist, withdrawal is necessary. Without it, the artist in us feels vexed, angry out of sorts. If such deprivation continues, our artist becomes sullen, depressed, hostile.” Julia Cameron

You may have read that and thought that is nice, but I am not an artist. And, I have thought that many times, oh I am not an artist, that is for those really eccentric, creative geniuses!! Right!! Well, guess what you are a creative genius and so am I.

Say it to yourself, “I am an artist! I am an artist!” :) And, listen for the inner critic to say, Oh no your not, have you seen how you draw! :) Fun Fun!

Well the truth of it is that you are the artist of your life. Maybe you can’t paint, or sing, or dance, or sculpt or write poetry, or do whatever you think an artist does…who cares. You can bring your artistry into your life, into every aspect of your life. So, that when you look at your life you feel great. You feel like it is your masterpiece. It is my personal opinion but I think that greatest masterpiece we could ever create is our LIFE!

So, now that we have established we are all artists! We now need to take a look at this quote. Downtime, solitude…How much of that do you give yourself? I love time to myself. I am never bored with myself. I am a very creative person and I can always come up with something creative to do with my time. And often times I feel like withdrawing from the world. And, my inner critic comes in and says…”stop being so selfish, you need to be in the world, you are running away…” And, what I have to say is “ YES I am being selfish for great reasons, the more I take care of me that more I can give, and yes, I do need to be in the world and damn right I am running away to my safe haven called my deeper and higher SELF.” You go girl! :)

So, remember to take time out for your artist. Give her or him the time to relax, unwind, be alone, and do nothing! And, when you start to feel yourself getting irritated and our of sorts. Ask yourself if you need some good ole withdrawal time. And, if the answer is YES, CREATE IT NOW! :)