Respect Yourself

Yes, the sign next to her says, “If you ever knew how powerful a negative thought was, you’d never have another.”

Once upon a time in my life, I was so creative. The piece to the Lady’s right is a vase I made as part of a mystery project where you have no idea what you are doing until it is done. And even then . . .

So I had this magical idea to make a bunch of muslin ladies and wrap them in red and stand them upon a sort of sculptural hill. They would be all moving up the hill and all of them would be like this one.

But then, the Boogeyman of Creativity moved into my mind and told me I should get someone else to look at it before I finished it. So off we went, the lady held carefully out in front of me.

We arrived across the street at the mobile home of the Queen of Creativity. Now she wasn’t just the Queen, but she KNEW that she was the Queen, and so she did what all Queens do, and that was to tear my Lady in Red apart, word by word. What had I done right? Did I not KNOW that I could NEVER do ANYTHING as good as she could?

Back home again, I looked sadly at the Lady in Red once again, and buried her in my drawer in a cardboard box with all the muslin figures who by a few well aimed words were doomed never to become Ladies in Red.

Then after many, many years, the Lady in Red was rediscovered by an old Arteologist. She held the Lady in Red and looked her over again, and she discovered the most wonderful thing. The Lady in Red WAS good. She was damned good! And she was ONE of a kind!

The Arteologist placed the sacred Lady in Red on top of her desk next to the Vase that was the resting places for many sacred things that she had discovered from the deep, dark recesses of her soul. It is the place where lessons of life are born . . .

So here we are on the eve of Christmas and I believe the message for the day is “Respect Yourself.” Respect the magic you bring to the world, and respect what you create. You AND your creativity are sacred. They are the beautiful memories you leave behind you to tell your story. And every one of us needs a story.