When I Grow Up

 In full honesty: I wonder how to begin this little post, and I wonder exactly where it's going.

This past year has been hard in ways that the years before it were not. I've had time on my hands that I proceeded to immediately fill to overflowing. I've occupied myself with a small variety of part-time work and referred to myself with a number of different occupational labels. The problem is, do you call yourself a dancer when you're not performing? Do you call yourself a writer when you have no consistent writing routine? Do you merely answer with a list of all the things you're ‘doing’, and then feel embarrassed by how disconnected and random they seem, and after a while you stop wanting to answer the question at all? How ought you to move forward when you don't even really know what you want to move to?

And then I look back on all the things I have done or used to do, and I wonder why I don’t seem to have as much capacity and energy as I did back then, and why it is that I’m “only” doing these few random things. Perhaps it’s simply that I’ve always been able to rise to whatever the occasion demanded. And right now, the occasion is…well, not what I expected.

Modern vocational advice would, it seems, have me pursuing every possible opportunity related to my career. In lieu of such opportunities, I probably ought to at least be working full-time at any old job and just earning a decent salary. Instead, I currently work two days a week at a bakery just because I like it, have turned down several professional opportunities because the timing wasn’t right, and have no clear picture of exactly where I’m going with my career.

Confusion has become a regular companion in these last few months. Sometimes confusion turns into anger, discouragement, or even despair. I wonder what on earth I’m doing with my life. I wonder if I have missed opportunities or failed to seek them out. I wonder if I’ll ever find the right fit vocationally. I have taken multiple personality, strength, and career aptitude assessments to see if I’ve missed something. After all, maybe the one perfect job is out there somewhere just waiting for me to step into it and bloom.

A couple things consistently stand out from these tests: I am highly artistic, and I love hospitality. Of course, I already knew this. But do people get real jobs working in these fields? Is it okay that I’ll probably never make a lot of money? And what do I do with the fact that if I pursue any one specialization within either of these fields, I might be partially satisfied, but I’ll always wish I had more time to pursue all the others too?

That’s when I finally realized what my vocation is: simply put, I am an artist.

I generally associate that title with people who are very gifted at painting, or sculpture, or drawing, or something else in the arena of fine arts. I wouldn’t presume to call myself particularly gifted at any of these. But I love all of them, whether in practice or in theory. I am a dancer. I am a choreographer. I am a writer. I love baking and cooking. I love hospitality, decorating, and entertaining. I want to learn every skill for which you can buy supplies in a craft store. I love working in coffee shops and bakeries. I love browsing through bookstores and home décor stores and kitchen stores and paper stores. I enjoy sewing and embroidery and knitting, I can make amateur art, I love scrapbooking. I still have a sand sculpting kit in my closet, crayons and Play-Doh in my desk drawer. When it comes down to it, all my interests are artistic in some way or another.

Even more than this, though, I view the world through an artistic lens. I connect to God the most through soul-stirring music, majestic spaces, journaling, and meditating on his incredibly beautiful story. When I listen to music, I’m often thinking of how I would choreograph to it. I’m constantly collecting ideas and quotes for a book I’m writing. I am touched by profound moments and poetic writing styles and good hiking trails, and I can get inspired just walking through the grocery store or having coffee with a friend, and I’m struck with the beauty and fullness and vast possibilities of life all over again.

And then I remember that despite many intervening years of trying to figure out what my calling is, I’ve actually known it since I was 17. I still remember the moment: I was a newly licensed driver, coming home on a narrow tree-lined road after a summer community college class (unsurprisingly, art), windows down and warm air rushing in and “City on Our Knees” playing on the radio, and suddenly it hit me: I want to make the world more beautiful. As simple as that. Simple, and yet infinitely multi-faceted, because beauty goes far deeper than surface aesthetics and I can’t think of a single aspect of life that couldn’t do with being transformed into just one higher degree of loveliness.

But I’ve been struggling against that all these years because beauty doesn’t seem…well, important. Doesn’t something seem askew that my soul yearns to enjoy a good cup of tea from an heirloom china teacup and a piece of homemade cake in someone’s beautifully decorated living room while surrounded by books and feasting on deep conversation, while other people out in the world are yearning just to eat anything and have a roof over their heads at all? Shouldn’t I go into medicine or social work or something useful? Shouldn’t I be okay with making do and living simply and getting by just with what is necessary?

I don’t have all the answers to the tough questions. But here are a few things I do know.

Art changes cultures and it changes people. Truth can sometimes touch deeper and be understood more completely through story, through song, through poetry, through painting, through art. Beautiful things can heal and inspire and nourish. Creativity is an incredibly therapeutic outlet in any form, at any level of training.

Moreover, beauty reflects an essential aspect of God and the things he values. Just one look around nature can easily confirm that. Birds and flowers and mountains and oceans and sunsets don’t have to be beautiful, but they are. The very first thing we see God doing in Scripture is creating. God is an artist, and he made us in his image, which means that we too all have the capacity to create. This is in fact one of the ways in which we are unique among the rest of creation. Step into an old high church, and perhaps breathe in the aroma of burning incense, and try to take in all of the gilding and architecture and sculpture and paintings and mosaics, intricate and costly and incredibly time-consuming to create, and then remember: all of these are meant to reflect God and honor God and point us to God, and even then they can’t possibly scratch the surface of who he is and his own beauty.

To quote my wise mother, in response to my struggles over this issue: “Beauty is something we all yearn for because we yearn for God; we yearn for Eden; we yearn for the final heaven – all beautiful. When someone creates a lovely cupcake, dances a ballet, sings a song, builds a stunning building, paints a lovely picture, they are all pointing to God.”

Finally, I think it’s important and telling to remember what the artist actually does in his process. In the case of drawing, for example, the artist’s job is first to be a careful observer of what he sees. Observation comes before imitation, before re-creation, before the pencil is put to paper. To faithfully image the scene before him, as he does the work of observing, he must constantly ask: where are the shadows? And therefore, in source, in contrast, in response: where is the light?

I let this picture sink in for just a minute, and then I wonder: is it not the calling of every artist to ask themselves those same two questions? And in asking them faithfully, and portraying the answers, don’t artists play an extremely essential role in society and humanity?

This is exactly what I want to do: observe the world, and chase after the light, and point people to God through the things I create, the beauty I seek to cultivate, the art of living the life he has given me.

But what about the fact that the art I do make is not at a virtuoso level? How about that I don’t have the ideal body type for ballet and despite doing it all my life it’s still a struggle? How about that I’m not formally trained in any type of fine art, or have yet to be paid to choreograph? How about that I’m entirely a self-taught writer, or have never taken a true culinary class? I mean – what do I really have to offer anyway? How can I possibly be confident in the art I make when I’m wallowing in gooey insecurity about it?

Well, although it can feel narcissistic, if I’m going to take this seriously I have to give myself a little confidence boost. I have to remind myself of what I can do. No, I can’t offer it all. But I can offer what I do have.

I am not the best technical dancer you’ve ever seen, and I’m unlikely to impress you with tricks or virtuosity. But I am a performer. I can express stories and emotions on stage and make you feel something. When I was little, a few strangers said that once they found me on stage, they didn’t watch anyone else. People have told me that they can see how close to God I am through the way I dance, or that I tell a beautiful story through my dancing, or that they can see that there’s deeper meaning going on under the surface and it comes through when I perform.

My choreography is not the most innovative or impressive you’ll see. But people have told me that it moves them and makes them cry. I try to make it accessible, to have an underlying theme or story, to be beautiful and a little hopeful even if it’s dealing with something hard. I want it to be relatable. I want it to be human.

I didn’t major in creative writing. I’ve tried a couple times to submit a poem I personally love to a writing contest without any results. My stuff isn’t avant-garde or staggering enough, I guess, and I know that. But, hands-down, I process and communicate best through the written word. Inspiration hits and I can write a blog post or essay in a couple of hours with minimal editing needed. I’m working on a book whose most original form took shape when I was eight. The idea of it, allegorical and challenging and multi-layered and hopeful and beautiful and constantly morphing, haunts me continually. At the same time, I’m terrified I won’t be able to do it justice. But it’s something I feel like I have to do. And so, despite some misgivings about the usefulness of spending hours and hours on a project that I’m not sure will ever come to anything big, I think I must see it through.

The list goes on. I’m an amateur baker and mostly just follow the recipes I have, but people tell me they love what I make. I don’t spend a lot of time reading interior design magazines, but people tell me our house is warm and cozy and lovely. In other words, despite being quite undertalented or undertrained in most creative areas, I find that I am somehow able to intuitively understand creative things, whether it’s matching colors or sensing a lack of design balance. And I find that no matter how hard I try to ignore my artistic bent or relegate it to someday when I have time, or try to tell myself that art isn’t important, that I should just grow up and get a “real job”, I still cannot get away from it. Not to be cliché, but I think it’s in my blood.

It’s taken a long time to get to the point of being okay with that, but I think maybe I’m finally there. I’m learning to be comfortable in this new way to identify my vocation. What do I do? Well, I’m an artist. What that means is allowed to change, and grow, and lean into the wind as the seasons of life come and go. Sometimes it means I’m a professional dancer performing consistently with a company. Sometimes it means I work in a coffee shop and make warm drinks and warm conversation to warm people up inside. Sometimes it means I teach basic art to kindergarteners or substitute for an advanced contemporary dance class. Sometimes it means I choreograph a dance and rehearse it with a friend to get it filmed and hope that people watch it, with no assurance that they actually will. Maybe in some seasons it means I invest in making my home a beautiful, peaceful place for people to escape to for a few minutes or a few days. Maybe someday it’ll mean I focus on the art of raising a couple of children. Maybe it means I write out my thoughts on some topic on the chance that my words might be exactly what someone needs to hear. Maybe it means conversation and presence with people. Maybe it means cooking them food. Maybe it means buying them flowers. Maybe all it means is that I sit down at the kitchen table with crayons and a coloring book because I’m still six years old at heart and it makes me feel safe. Maybe it means I allow my creative or productive output to ebb and flow with the seasons, according to my responsibilities and energy levels and the deeper needs of my soul and what God calls me to do, and maybe that’s really, truly okay.

In other and fewer words, it means I don’t really have to have my whole life and career track mapped out. But wherever I am, whatever I’m doing, I can make art. I can make the world around me a little more beautiful with something as gloriously simple as a smile. And I hope, maybe, I can make something that could change the way you think, or the way you see God, and draw you just a little closer to who is and who he wants to be for all of us.

And so, let’s not be afraid to make art. Let’s get together in coffee shops and work on our own writing projects in the life-giving presence of other creative people. Let’s share simple homemade meals and picture-perfect desserts. Let’s teach each other how to paint, how to sculpt, how to dance. Let’s have book clubs and gardening clubs and coloring clubs. Let’s make gatherings where we all bring a craft project to work on while we gab and listen to music and drink tea. Let’s go on hikes and pick blueberries and watch fireworks and get lost in absorbing movies and make cookies and try new things together. Let’s get messy and get frustrated and make mistakes and make no money but still feel one hundred percent fulfilled. For if there’s anywhere creativity thrives most, I think, it’s in community. It’s knowing that you’re not the only crazy person out there who mentally narrates daily events like you’re writing them or thinks through choreography to fall asleep or feels soul-settled when you walk into a bookstore.

In short, it’s knowing that you don’t dream alone.

And so, as we come to the end of this post, I guess I have at last discovered where it was meant to go. Perhaps, in some ways, that’s a metaphor for the larger story I’m trying to tell. Matisse said that creativity takes courage. It must take a first step without knowing exactly where it’s going to end up; it just knows that if it didn’t take the step, it would always be dissatisfied.

I suppose, then, that this is my first step.

P.S. If this resonates with you at all, or if you have anything to add, please comment or reach out to me. I would love to hear from you on this topic!