My mission? Glad you asked!

I signed up for an expensive course that promised it would teach me how to make money selling my art. The gist of the method was to discover one’s “mission” and convey it to people along with emotional stories that would create a genuine human connection. “Make ‘em cry and watch ‘em buy,” our guru snickered. 

I did the whole mission-discovery process of narrating to a recorder my most joyful and most painful memories, then listening back and having my higher self tell me the lesson I was meant to learn from each. Then She (my higher self) listened to all the stories and all the lessons in one big emotional orgy and told me the lesson I was meant to have learned from All of It. This grand lesson, transcribed word-for-word, was then to be my Mission. 

The process was instructive and resulted in a little spiel that was not untrue but took a long time to say out loud to others–turns out my higher self is wordy. Plus, including one or two of my most painful or joyful moments in the telling never felt natural, at all. I never decided officially to drop the approach, but I let it slide. I feel like I’m able to form genuine human connection by listening to other people, being honest with them, looking in their eyes, you know, normal human shit. 

But I have an open studio coming up, and I’m wondering, wait, should I be brushing off my Mission in case opportunity strikes? Our guru wanted us to put the words “ask me about my mission” on a little sign in our studio and on printed material. Should I be doing that??? 

“Probably not,” says my Higher Self. “You can just be yourself.” 

“Phew,” I say. 

“But you could try writing something about it in a blog post.”

“That’s what I’m trying to do.”

“Okay, well you haven’t actually said what your mission is.”

“Okay, I’ll try.”

People suffer when they don’t give themselves permission to prioritize the things that bring them real joy. I don’t mean just pleasure or happiness, I mean real transcendent Joy, the stuff that makes us feel like we’re connected to a greater mystery, like when we were children at the ocean, or when we’re singing with people we love, in harmony, or whatever it is for you. The system we live in makes it hard to stay connected to our joy–there are so many boxes we think we need to check and so little time to check them. And often, our joy doesn’t pay the bills. I think people should do whatever it takes to put their joy first anyway. Not just for their own sake but for the world’s. I think following one’s joy is going to be the way for someone to best serve others. It might take some work to figure out how, but ultimately it will be. It’s not selfish, it’s not frivolous, it’s the core stuff of life, and nourishment for the hard work of living and helping others. 

My mission is to tell people that, and try to convince them of it, when the opportunity presents itself, and to be an example myself. I’ve suffered intensely over unchecked boxes–horrible shame at not having achieved enough or figured out how to make money or done enough to help others–I’m talking hardcore Shame; I’m-a-failure shame, sobbing in a heap on the ground shame, shame that made me imagine hitting myself, hard, in the face, as punishment for my lack of accomplishment. And I’m a fairly accomplished person! I’d just totally submitted to the capitalist notion of money equaling worth, and the perfectability of one’s very life as like, a product that should be supremely functional, uniquely helpful, beautiful, and, perhaps most importantly, shiny.

That shame lasted from about age 21 (graduation into the “real world”) to about age 37, 38. Yup. That long.

Luckily, at the same time I’d never been able to give up on the things that brought me joy–in my case, all things beautiful, both of art and of nature. Beauty sustained me and I turned to the arts, all of them, and God’s canvas, the land and sky and water, for nourishment. Thank God(dess) I did. The only thing I was lacking was self-acceptance. All I needed was permission to put beauty first, to stop apologizing for needing it and actually say, “this is what I’m about.”

I’ve given myself that permission. It hasn’t solved all my problems, but DAMN it’s better than shame. I’m lighter in my heart and happier in my head and a more helpful person to have around. I strongly suggest you do the same.

Now, buy my art.

Me acting—something that brings me joy and that I seem to come back to now and then despite it not feeling helpful or paying any bills.