About a month ago, I purchased a used sewing machine on ebay. I've been thinking about buying a sewing machine seriously for a few years, though I really knew I wanted one when I was just tall enough to peek over the edge of a yellowed wooden table to watch my mom sew beautiful things with her new gleaming Bernina.
I've always been envious of confident artists: poised, self-assured as they make bold strokes across a piece of canvas, voraciously write paragraphs of exquisitely strung-together sentences, or decisively press down the button and hear the shutter close with satisfaction. I watch hopeful their artistic certainty will rub off. Fear paralyzes me.
Fear of art not measuring up to self-imposed standards, of it not being interesting enough, perfect enough, inspired enough. So I think about stories I'd like to write, photographs I'd like to take, and fabric I'd like to sew...and sit on my hands for fear it will not be enough.
I feel it my duty to disabuse you of the notion that artists are confident. Most of the artists I know, and I know a lot, are not confident. The hours of practice, unseen, unknown, and unremarkable, are full of frustration, disappointment, temptation to give up, and only the occasional sense of getting it right. The journey of seeing perfectionism tempered by gratitude, wonder, and discipline is a lifelong one, and one I heartily recommend!!
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