Every spring and summer I spend a lot of time in my garden; in the spring I am planting seeds, nurturing seedlings and watching them grow. In the summer, I watch my garden more closely, with my guard up because of past experiences with pests wiping out what I have created and grown on my garden canvas.  Last year the sparrows decided to strip my kale down to the stem leaving me no choice but to be more rigorous in protecting it this year.  I have also had to contend with various insects like cut worms and cabbage moths and have had to figure out ways to protect my seedlings and growing plants.  So this year I made a fence of bird netting around  my plants that needed protection. Things were good, the cabbage moths were mostly kept under control, unable to lay their eggs on the kale. Dealing with slugs were a little more work, spreading eggshells helped but I really need to keep working at it, planting and re planting several times for my bean plants.  Just as I was feeling confident that my kale was protected, yesterday when I went to check on my garden I noticed that the majority of my carrot tops were chopped off and something other than slugs and caterpillars had been chomping my kale down to the stems again!  And then it dawned on me, I had let things go. I had spent so much time protecting and guarding that I forgot to check-in, harvest a bit, what was I saving up for anyway? The other week during one of my self-care workshops at my home studio, one of the participants noticed a ground-hog strolling through my urban Toronto garden. In hindsight I now realize that I waited to long to harvest some of the crops, so Mr. Groundhog beat me to it!

This garden of mine is a lot of work, it requires time, patience, persistence and love.  It requires the right tools, some support (research and literally tying plants to poles for support to grow), and the engagement of my creative mind for solutions.  It requires humility; When I think I have it figured out, I realize I have to keep working at it, keep up a consistent pace of care and observation.  It requires acceptance of what is; when there is a crop loss I can either give up completely and “throw in the towel” or I can keep going.  It allows for a lot of mindfulness; time spent in the garden is opportunity to be present and in the moment rather than caught up with the past or future (though there is always the chance that my mind will wander while problem solving, mostly as I search for and pick the raspberries I am present focused.

My garden is my canvas and my canvas can be like my garden.  When I create art the process takes a similar path. Art making can be so reflective of life in general, the ups and downs, the necessary failures and acceptances.  Sometimes when the seeds of an idea are formed on paper, they grow differently than I anticipate. The pests I have to contend with are my own self-judgment, the inner critic and comparison monster.  I can try to defend against them: if I ignore them they will get to me eventually, If I prepare for them, I am less likely to be devastated when they eat away at my art process as it grows, if I focus all of my attention to defending against these creativity pests I miss out on the journey, consumed by the  product.

Sustaining a creative practice can take a lot of work.  It requires that we set time aside for it to unfold and grow.  It needs our patience and persistence when we feel like giving up is precisely when we need to hang in there. It requires our attention, love, and humility; self-love and acceptance of what is goes a long way in sustaining our creative practice.  We aren’t always going to like the end product, and rightly so as the process of creating in and of itself has so many life lessons.  when we figure out a way to keep our creative practice going, life will throw us off-balance and we will need to learn to ride the waves differently.  And our art making practice can give us many opportunities to ride the waves of life, self-expression, release, relaxation, and mindfulness can all come into play when our creative practice is process focused.