Mind Over Matter

                Anyone who has ever learned something really difficult will understand what I am talking about. I mastered the act of rowing in a single handed skiff . This is a row boat a couple of inches wider than a regular human body but 2 or 3 times their height in length. The combination of oars flat on the water together with the length of the boat forms a strong balance in which you cannot flip the boat and fall into the water. When it accumulates speed, it is easy to balance your body and slide the seat in order to plunge the oars into the water; much like riding a bicycle. But you need to lift the oars to gain speed, so for a fraction of a second you will have no speed and no balance through the oars. I learned to row a skiff and I can still remember the feeling of victory that went through my mind when I could hear the rumbling of the water like pebbles against the stern on an early morning on Indian Creek.

Learning to draw and paint is equally difficult. It is finding the balance between eye focus, hand coordination, and the brain. The brain wants to tell you tricks all the time how you are wasting your time, how you cannot do it and other nasty thoughts that will prevent you from making a good well liked drawing of something. Being stronger than the  brain and listening carefully to the messages, will enable you to get a strong balance between eye, hand and brain. It takes 10,000 hours to become really good at something. That means 28 years drawing one hour every day, or in office terms, 8 hours a day 5 days a week for 5 years with some vacation. 

                “This is do-able.” I told myself when I began painting professionally.  I would pride myself in being able to stand still for hours at a time being bitten by musquitos and burned by the sun in order to get a good painting. I forgot about the 10,000 hours, a pay check or even the quest to become good at something. Painting and drawing became my life. I was emotionally and spiritually involved in the whole thing as I became more and more intrigued by the endless challenges and possibilities.

             Then one day my body did not want to play any more and my right arm acted up painfully. I ignored it first, than got some advice from fellow painters, took ibuprofen and hot baths and rested my arm. I was in the middle of a large series of paintings that I felt were my best work ever, and I truly could not stop. Ignoring my mind had been good for teaching myself to paint, but this time I had to listen but it took me some time to undo the ignoring.

               I went to the doctor because I thought if he also had 10,000 hours of excellence he should be able to help me really understand what was going on. I had to spend a whole morning to meet this specialist. I had to find the hospital, park my car, walk to different places to find where his office was located, fill in all sorts of forms and wait. The doctor was a friendly guy who took five minutes of his precious time to examine my arm and to talk to me. There was nothing to see on the outside. My arm looked strong and suntanned, healthy as could be. I had to describe my complaints. “When you pass fifty years of age a lot of people have to deal with this kind of inflammation. It’s called a tennis arm. You just have to deal with it. Go to CVS, buy a brace, take ibuprofen and if it does not get better come back” “But I have a mural to paint” “Come back and I will inject you with cortisone” “I don’t like cortisone” “Your choice. I can also operate”. “Thank you doctor”

                        Driving back to my studio I thought this was a lousy visit. If doctors are mad because patients go to the internet to figure out themselves what they need, they should look a little bit closer to what they really mean to the patient. I got really mad when a bill for 250 dollars was sent to my house. So many people are on their own for dealing with health issues that I cannot even imagine the army of folks who keep taking this kind of abuse so the system keeps surviving. I was not taking it.

                I had to tap in to my own wisdom to deal with this issue just like we use to do living on a small Caribbean Island where help, any help was far away. I meditated to reach the core of the problem. It came down to the fact that my body was growing out of balance. My right side was over used out of habit. Posture and attitude in my mother language has the same word (houding) I had to change my attitude towards my posture in order to recreate balance. I could not find anything else to correct this other than my mind would simply have to work with my left arm to learn to paint too.

              “This was going to be really hard” I thought, but much to my surprise I noticed that my left arm loved to be part of the game. For the big heavy areas it’s my left arm that does all the work while my right lingers leisurely on my back.(I do that on purpose because the domineering side is too eager to take over) For the fine tuning the right can have his own moment to shine. My body feels more balanced and the pain is very manageable. I don’t even take ibuprofen or hot baths.

               I would like to talk to the doctor again and ask him how would he feel if he bought an original painting from me and then got a cheap reproduction for the same price. His job could be so much more interesting and fascinating, if we would have looked together at the holistic part of pain, balance and attitude. I understand he needs to pay his mortgage or his ex-wife but for me I might as well drive my car with the windows open and throw dollar bills out of the window.

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