Creative Journaling: forgetting how to play
I apologize for being AWOL on LJ this week. I’d like to say that I’ve been writing, wrapping presents, and decorating the Christmas tree. But no, I’ve been sidelined by cooties. Oh, woe is me! I’ve missed two weeks’ worth of voice lessons, and my tambourine is temporarily silenced.
Still, I managed to drag myself to a creative journaling workshop, and oh, I was really glad I did. Stace introduced us a new technique: washing diluted Gesso over watercolor-penciled, collaged backgrounds. I love how it mutes the colors, how it gives images a dream-like quality. Look at the little girl on the right…can’t you almost imagine you’re glancing at her through a frosted windowpane? I wonder what book she’s reading, where that hummingbird is headed…
Now turn your attention to the page on the left. I’m not loving it–you either? It’s pretty clear that my vision got lost in translation. Instead of thinking about the overarching theme,* I got fixated on the tiniest of details. And, um, it shows. There’s no overall cohesiveness, and the images are blurred beyond recognition by the gloppy layers (upon layers) of products I used to cover my "mistakes."
Creative journaling is supposed to be playful, more bouncy Tigger than thinky Pooh. Unfortunately, I lost sight of that this week. We talked about this in the workshop–how we so often focus on product vs. process. When we take it (or ourselves) too seriously, we rob ourselves of recess.
No worries, though: I’ll carry that (re)discovery over to the next set of pages. And hmm…if I squint my eyes and tilt my head just so, I’ll probably find a few writing lessons in this, as well!
*Themes/metaphors are totally unnecessary, by the way. But hey, that’s how I roll.