This weeks confusion and Creative Saboteurs

This is very wild that I would receive words to this effect..my years word is Relationships and God knows I  struggle with that...I can blame it on my up bring of years of feeling not good enough with the dyslexia but then that locks me into a place of no hope...yes it's been a some what demon all my life but it's been a blessing to. So lets say I have a love/hate relationship with it.. as anyone with a disability would..The great thing is, it's not stopped me from living the dreams of being a creative soul so I'm grateful for that...

here is something some shared with me yesterday...
"the bond you form with others are really about you-even in the most difficult situations. They're meant to be mirrors for you, always reflecting back what you need to see. Ask yourself: what am I learning from this relationship? What new qualities am I developing? Is this partnership from my highest good? How can I make it stronger? Are we teaching each other? What have I discovered or ma still uncovering about myself through this union? Are the people in my life empowering and encouraging me to be all that I can be? Within every relationship, there's an encoded lesson that you've hopefully gleaned or in some cases, one that you still need to learn.

Well so crazy how the reading and introspective work is working in my life and how things have a way of connection when you lest expect it to..

So on with week 8's last section...Creative Saboteurs

Most environments have some undesirable elements..mosquito season in the hot wet south..winter chills. Even idyllic environments have their hostile elements and, as artists, we need to know and name the elements in our environment that are clear and present dangers of the trail. As an artist, I must pay equal heed to the psychologically dangerous denizens of my environment. I call these characters"Creative Saboteurs", and the appearance of any of them just like sighting a baby rattler on the evening's stroll-can focus our attention on survival and off the beauty of whatever it was we were making.  A creative saboteurs doesn't always rattle before it' strikes, so we do need a measure of self-protective alertness.

A creative saboteurs is not friendly animal, and no matter how innocent it may try to appear, it's very presence means you must be alert to impending damage to you  and your dreams.

A playful name for a creative saboteur allows us to retain a sense of our own power. "Why, it's just a Wet Blanket Matador."

This character will use an energetic wet blanket to deflect, dampen and confuse your creative thrust.

Wet Blanket Matadors like to employ an air of sad superiority, as if they have seen you and your like come and go countless times before.

Successfully identified, a Wet Blanket Matador becomes less a saboteur then an occasion of comic relief. 

Then theirs the Amateur Expert. Like the Wet Blanket Matador, this citizen dwells on negativity but bolsters his opinions with the company of facts and figures that may have no relevance whatsoever to the actual success of you progress. 

Both the Wet Blanket Matador and the Amateur Expert bludgeon creatives by their presumed superiority.  (OK got to mirror this...as I bet I've got a bit of this going on in me as I let my ego take hold sometimes and I come across with superiority.  There is are time thought that I do especially with the teaching side of things as of experience, different but yet it can get out of hand at times.)

Quote: The thing that makes you exceptional, if you are at all is inevitably that which must also make you lonely.  Lorraine Hansberry

These people are about who's who and not what's what.  If you're Beethoven, you'd better be able to prove it. Contact with a VIP normally leaves an artist feeling very unimportant...

No petty here but all my life I had the feeling and understanding that Everyone was a VIP in my life so when I gain a bit of confidence or myself and I know what I'm doing and get a good hint of the direction I'm to be heading with my life...worked hard to struggle through the stuff..and to have a wet blanket upon me there jargon...Ouch! over sensitive..yes you could say so and crushed that too.. but as I'm learning it didn't kill me..yet so the only choice is to grow a bit stronger each time..

Julia continues...As artists, we often, far more often, more insecure than grandiose.  We are stubborn as crabgrass, yes, but we are just as easily stepped on. Yes, we spring back-but sometimes only after years of discouragement. As we move our art into public venues, what we need is to find a few friends who encourage us by mirroring our competency-that, and the inner resolve to post a few signs that say "Keep off the Grass"   Or I had someone tell me why don't you tell me to go get fu___. I couldn't say that then and it feels weird to say it now.

Surviving  a Creative Saboteur is like surviving a snakebite. it can be done and it makes a good story afterward. However, the first step-as with any snakebite-is to name and contain the poison.  I have to name it and identify it...

We can not afford our own or anyone Else's denial. We have been bitten. We have been poisoned. Damage has been done and the delicate and fin nerve endings of our art are badly hurt. Step One is to get away so that you are not bitten again. Dont' stand stocks till in astonishment, poking the snake to see if it might want to bite again. Snakes bite. They bite once and they do bite again. If you think you have been bitten jump back. Don't listen to people who want you to "find the lesson" in your experience. There will be plenty of time for that afterwards. For right now, put distance between you and the snake. 

First administer first aid. That means you acknowledge you have been bitten, don't pretend you have not, and reach for the antidote. the antidote is someone who supports you before, during and after your creative injuries.

The answer to "what can I do to help?" is very straightforward; "Love me" "help me forgive myself for having gotten fooled, hurt, bitten. Help me to let myself off the hook and not blame me for someone else's bad behavior. "Help me stop calling myself stupid. Tell me, accidents happen. there are snakes out there. Why any one of us could have run into a nasty creature like you did"

It is spiritual law that if we can't always avoid injury, we can always later turn it to good use.  The silver lining of surviving snake bites is the compassion that is bring to bear both toward ourselves and later toward others. There will always be creative saboteurs. Their bit will always sting and as we learn to identify them and avoid them, we can share our experience, strength, and hope with others. Creative saboteurs hurt us, but they can't be survived. 

well for me this was a very powerful ending to a week and I'm turning it around and seeing it all from a different light.. crazy as this all sounds and maybe a few will understand...it really all comes down to being a fulltime person in our own life and the trails and trips that make you who you are and help you grow into the person your suppose to be no matter what age you are...look to yourself for the change first is always a better choice then to change the outside circumstances... long road but a joyful road when I can be the creative soul I'm meant to be. Answering to a Higher source and follow that good orderly directions that's not failed me yet is hard to stay with and takes a daily work session...but when I do it I am living a dream of mine..