This blog used to be random thoughts about auditing. As auditing slips out of my consciousness I will now address random thoughts about creating art.  Several years ago I realized that whatever I was working on would eventually be successful.  Sometimes I would leave my studio frustrated and think that I would never finish a piece.  Then I would come back with fresh eyes and see that I was almost there.  Recently I happened upon some writing from other artists that confirms what I learned.  Here is  quote from an artist, Teresita Fernandez, that another artist, Lauren Mantecon, posted on her Facebook page.

"A kind of panic sets in the very next day, an urge to get into the studio because you know you have to start all over again, building something from nothing, seeking the company of those trusted beneficial failures, waiting for those absurd internal dialogues with your own gang of voices.  It's not a very glamorous scenario.  But this is precisely what internal success looks like.  It is visible only to yourself and while you can trick the rest of the world into thinking you are a good artist, you can never really convince yourself, which is why you keep trying.  If you're lucky and motivated enough to keep making art, life is quiet, you get to work at what you love doing, happily chipping away at something, constructing something, adjusting to a cycle of highs and lows and in between, and it doesn't matter if you've been doing it for two years or 50 years, the patterns remain exactly the same.  The anxiety continues to set in, the doubts creep in, the baby steps towards mending fragments starts all over again, the cautious urge to peek between the cracks is there.  When you find yourself in that place, that's when you'll know that the inside is driving the outside."

I have also been reading Ellen J. Langer a psychologist who has done interesting work on "mindfulness" and one started to paint.  She states "All it takes to become an artist is to start doing art."