Sunday, September 23, 2018

Finding Motivation when Life Spirals Downward

The moon rises over the mesa at Ghost Ranch where Georgia O'Keeffe had her summer home. We went on a sunset horseback ride to see her house and the landscape she painted.

It was just extraordinary.

We also did a tour of her winter home and studio in Abiquiu. I've done this one before and love to do it every time I have an out-of-town visitor interested. Seeing where and how this prolific and fantastic artist lived and worked is an enormous education in examining life choices. She surrounded herself with beauty and - though she was a millionaire by that point in her life - Georgia lived a very minimalist and simple life.

All of her choices focused on making herself into a better artist.

Our topic this week at the SFF Seven is "Finding motivation when life spirals downward."

What I've discovered - for myself and from examples like Georgia O'Keeffe - is that the spiral of my life depends on my art, not the other way around. Writing provides an anchor and a ley line* for my life. The creativity is the wellspring of energy, writing is how I channel it, and that channeling provides the buffer and balance for everything else.

Sure, being able to produce art depends on having a life set up to be peaceful enough to do that, but for me - as Georgia did - that means constructing my life to put my work at the center. If my writing is going well, everything else goes well.

*the concept of a "ley line" is found in fantasy a lot and is like a river of magical energy

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