Some of My (many)Toxic Traits

A painting done with Casein Paint - which is made of milk protein 

Toxic Trait #1: I think things that shouldn't be funny but are, are most definitely even more comical.

For instance, a week or so ago, I was doing prep work for an art fair that was to take place the next day.
Art fair prep looks like I'm having romantic relations with my inkjet printer. I talk sweetly to it, I pay attention to it, I get irrationally angry at it, and I spend every waking second with it. We have long, meaningful, and meandering conversations.

It's a very selfish lover who takes and takes, and then it showers me with gifts—printed cards, art prints, gift tags, and bookmarks.

While having this affair with my inkjet printer, being a ball of stressed-out to-do list and pit stank, I declared that I was also going to make dinner.

Please keep in mind that I am NOT the chef in our household. Before I met Matt, my list of foods was limited to what came out of a box—mostly cereal.
I had breakfast cereals, dinner cereals, and, of course, snack and dessert cereals. I got my veggies by walking near the produce section in the grocery store on my way to the freezer section.
-I don't know how I'm still alive, either.

On one of our first dates, Matt invited me to his place, where he cooked steak, vegetables, and a side salad. I genuinely didn't know that you could make all of that at home without being at your parents' house. 

My declaration to make dinner mid-art fair prep was the declaration of a person not in their right mind.
The sight of Matt sitting very still, clearly terrified of me while I attempted to burn the house down in a variety of new and exciting ways struck me as so damn funny.

It also struck me that I had no business making dinner, and I laughed even harder when I saw Matt's look of relief when I turned the kitchen over to him.
He legitimately had to scrape burnt bits off the stovetop.

Upon reflection, though, while all of that was and still is funny as shit - I realized Toxic Trait #2 is believing I can do it all and more, planning to do it all, then being surprised when I don't get it all done.
Or, worse yet, getting it all done at a significant cost.

Somewhere along the way, I discovered that the busier I was, the more efficient I became. I remember with razor-sharp clarity when I learned this.

In college, I ended up with a final semester in which I was only taking one class. It was a class I needed to graduate, and it was only offered once a year, and it extended my graduation date by a semester.

In contrast, the semester before, I had taken on a boatload of credits, and I was working three part-time jobs—literally eating meals as I was walking from one job to the next, napping between classes, and thinking it was dumb that I paid rent at all. I remember wishing the library had dorm rooms because I was all but living there and going home to my apartment at night felt like a giant waste of time—it was a situation. 

But I recall that overly packed semester—I got so much done because I had to, in comparison to the lazy semester in which I could barely hand in any of my assignments on time because I could put my assignments off, so I did.

Ergo, I have this idea that I must be swamped and overly bogged down to be productive and that if I have room in my schedule, I will procrastinate and waste it. 

Fast-forward 30 odd years, and here I am, trying to make dinner in some deranged effort to get all the things done that I want to get done.

I started picking this apart in my last post about adding more and more to my plate. Now that I've been thinking about it for the previous few weeks, it's starting to make sense how this toxic trait came to be and I recognize it's something I want to change.

It's not serving me or making me happy, and one day, I'm going to burn down the house and not in an intentional "let it burn" way. 

So, after the art fair, in which I didn't even sell half of the cards and prints I stayed up late into the night making, I took a long, deep breath, cleaned up my studio, organized my shelves, and then spent the weekend reading books, sketching, napping, journaling, and sitting in the sun.

I ignored my responsibilities. I didn't put pressure on myself to make any art for the gallery, even though my wall there is a ghost town, which is what I "should" have been doing.
I almost didn't write this post. I was so committed to not doing anything I was "supposed" to, but I have my limits, and some things are sacred - The Nibbler MUST go out on time!

I let myself just BE - And wouldn't you know it?!??

I made some art that I absolutely love.

It's different and entirely different from my usual style.

Because I was in a play state of mind, I sat on the ground in a sunbeam, opened a new kind of paint that I'd never painted with before, experimented and explored, and didn't have any expectations of myself. 

It felt good. 

It felt so good that Monday morning responsibilities were a struggle, which confirms for me that I need more play, more time to experiment, and more time to just BE.
Let the era of just being begin!  

What is your toxic trait?