“Everything that happens once can never happen again. But everything that happens twice will surely happen a third time.”
― Paulo Coelho, The Alchemist
Making Things
This the title page of my first “published work” of art. Little did I know that a grade school project would plant a seed that would take almost 4 decades to grow into fullness.
Creativity has consistently provided my brain with a way to express itself. If there is something I’m pondering, or a series of life experiences that need a deeper understanding, my hands are gonna make something. when the piece is completed, or even while it’s in process, I’ll take time to ponder the semiotics of my inner machinations. What that means, if you don’t want to click the hyper linked word, is that the symbols and processes of what’s in front of me can give me answers I’m seeking. What do the colors represent? Were there lots of shapes? How is my noggin trying to communicate with me via images and symbols? This isn’t some special skill that only I possess, all humans do this. From how we decorate our homes, to the clothes we wear, our entire being is trying to share important information with ourself and others.
This is why, after a very long time, I stopped and just took a full look at the situations and experiences going on around me. The Universe has been trying to say something to me for quite some time, and I, in my abundant amount of knowledge, decided to overlook all of it. You know…because I know so much more than the Universe does. (insert pithy eye roll here)
Plus, I’m no quitter – perseverance is one of my fatal flaws. Maybe I seem wishy washy or disjointed online with all my declarations of “Here’s a great idea,” but in my own space I’m gonna keep trying to get that bent nail to hold pieces of wood together.
In this week’s podcast there’s a bit more detail, which can give a bit more insight to the previous words.
Helping People
Folks that listen to my podcast already know that my answer to, “What do you want to be when you grow up,” was to be a saxophone playing veterinarian nun. Or, in short, a creative helper that enjoyed listening and reminding folks of the beauty they contain within. While I wanted this to happen with animals, living on a farm taught me that my soul was far too sensitive to see animals in pain. After losing a kitten in a freak occurrence, my wee noggin began pondering how to help the humans around me.
So I started listening. A lot. Not just to the folks around me, but to the wind, the sound of grass growing, the movement of the stars, and the sounds of those buried in the cemetery close to my house. Sounds kooky, I know, but for every story I loved to share with others, another one was added from the environment around me. If you’ve ever taken a professional/credentialed class on storytelling, you already know that the main element of being a good tale teller is the art of listening.
In the work I’ve been doing, listening is the primary skill that helped folks feel better. Often times, when a person can “unpack” what’s going on in their mind, they can find a solution to that the concern, problem, or issue that was bothering them. From there, with some exercises in creativity, support, and compassion, many of my clients were able to “fix” themselves on their own.
However, and this is one of those things that I do like to go on about, the growing amount of influencer/viral information, apps, and so on have taken the traditional art of my work to some kind of wild level. Now the most sensational, and often times dangerous, content creator will talk up the benefits of something that they used to “cure” all the problems of their life. And, if you want to have a “cure,” too, all you need to do is pay an expensive monthly fee. Then, once you’ve learned what they are teaching, you can also tell others how to “cure” what ails them. No need to consult the old wise ones living in the wilds of the Liminal. Experience??? What’s that? What you need is this $100 bottle of limited edition octoflocktalotapus oil. Once you are fully “healed,” get your friends to get some, too. No need to learn anything, or take any classes, just do what you’re told, and you can become famous on social media.
Sounds good, right? I mean, dang, who wouldn’t want instant relief for all of life’s ailments?
Except it doesn’t work that way. Ever. This isn’t like taking ibuprofen for a headache. Lasting wellness doesn’t come in a pretty package, with bells and whistles. This is not something I’m saying as a person that has worked in that field, but from my own experiences. A few years ago I decided that it was time to work on healing parts of myself that had been overlooked. It took a full year to just let all that stuff out so I could look at it – nurture, love, and honor what it was telling me. From there it became easier to see where I needed to do some hard work. Healing can be spontaneous, with a full “all of a sudden” experience, but the preparation for that moment started long before feeling better.
Sometimes it just takes a long as it takes.
To circle this all together, it became pretty darn obvious to me, even though I kept trying for a long time, that the Universe has some better ideas in mind for how my life can best move forward. No one can say that I wasn’t trying, or that I didn’t give it my all, because friends and readers, there are folks that will tell you just how long I’ve been at this.
But now it’s time to move into that place that’s been waiting for me, and to see that my mantra/prayer of, “making things and helping people, while getting paid to do so,” worked. If I didn’t believe in magic before, let me just tell you, this past week has been a whole Willy Wonka-esque, slow-motion time lapse retrospective of, “This is Kim’s Life.” Gotta love working with the energies of Mercury Retrograde, after an eclipse, ending in a Full Moon, while the world at large deals with the wildness of 2024.
Not to invoke the podcast again, but I highly recommend you take a listen.
Getting Paid
After tying the whole walk of self-promotion via social media, and becoming discouraged at swimming against the tide (while also trying to keep my ego in check), I’m taking a whole different path via Patreon. It is just no longer enjoyable, or financially responsible, to keep banging my head against a wall. Along with that I am just very much done with giving my time away for free. Mr. This Mister should be retiring right now, getting ready to enjoy old age, but he is out there working hard to backfill what I’m not making in my work. The rest of the fam and I are not engaging in what we are calling, “Operation Mr. The Mister Retirement.” The inspiration for this was a series of events that kept pointing, sometimes in big neon lights, to return to the dreams of my youth – to create, to help, and to get paid. Yep, you read that last word correctly – “to get paid.” What that really means, at its core, is to value my time and talents by allowing a transaction to happen that shows others see your worth. As much as I told my clients, and others, to value what they do, my actions over here are way different. Mr. The Mister and the kiddos have always been patient with me when a client texts, or calls, because they know how much helping others is important to me. But let me just say this — when I talked to all of them this week about making a firm decision about making changes to my work, all of them were collectively like, “THANK THE HEAVENS!”
What does this all mean? Heck, I don’t know, really, other than I have walked through a whole initiation cycle. Or, rather, as I’ve talked about before, dragging myself to all the places I thought would have answers…only to learn it was already within. No need to dig for treasures at all the corners of the Earth, when the glittery jewel of contentment is already in the back yard.
So, with all that, please enjoy the podcast for this week, and check out the early phases of my Patreon. Who knows what you’ll see there – but I promise it will be entertaining!
Much love,
KEU
Kim Upton 