Be Brave Friday
Tonight I’m going to a paint and sip where we look at a Gustav Klimt landscape and sort of make it, I guess?
I am a little scared.
This is because at paint and sips there are these sort of expectations to make something that looks like what the instructor is telling you/showing you/mentoring you about.
And I?
I’m not the best at that.
When of my clearest memories of being a kid is of sitting at Smith-Holden Inc., a dental supply company where my nana worked and then my mom.
Everything in that office (even the rows and rows of veneers and fake teeth) bored me. I filed for like $1 an hour to keep me busy. I cracked the safe. I spun around in the chair. And I promised my little kid self that I would never be stuck in an office like they were.
To be fair, neither of them seemed to mind.
But me? I knew that I’d mind.
That’s the thing, right? You have to be brave enough to not follow the path everyone else is on and also be okay with that.
Everyone else doesn’t have a baby? You can have a baby.
Everyone else gets married? You don’t have to.
Your life’s work isn’t what your math teacher predicted in sixth grade? No worries.
Everyone else paints in between the lines? You can paint on things that aren’t even the canvas.
Your mom and your nana BOTH worked in that gray office? You can explore the world.
It shouldn’t be brave to be unconventional, but it is.
It shouldn’t be brave to live the life you want.
That standard path is a fine path. It does not have to be your path. And it especially shouldn’t be your path if you constantly feel trapped or constantly bored and if you are constantly complaining about your commute, your coworkers, your desk.
We tell ourselves a story of our life, right? We think that there are these essential elements that have to be in there (work 9-5, have 2.5 babies, marry before 30, marry after 50, get a camp).
If that story bores you?
If that story sort of sucks?
You can change it. You have to change it. Don’t live the story that you don’t want to, okay?
Klimt’s art stood out because he was different. He used gold leaf, he was a little frankly sexual in ways that weren’t popular at the time. He had a different take on color and pointillism and symbolism.
And all that lack of convention?
It made him something cool. It made what he created memorable.
But, honestly, what I hope the most is that it made him happy.
QUICK NOTE
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COMFORTING
I also have a once-a-week Substack over here and it’s mellow and I share a poem (not my own, God forbid, there’s nothing comforting about those), soup recipe, and other comforting things there. It’s just quietly hanging out there. You can come hang out, too.