"What we have is given by God and to teach it to others is to return it to him."

-Bernini, {Body Painting Inspired by Classical Sculpture)

So in the last few years, the most bizarre things that I do have become by far the most cathartic and then shortly thereafter the most professionally relevant.

I started doing body paintings and thought that- other than personal release that- they served no professional function whatsoever. They're a great flash-bang-pop in a photography portfolio- not unlike the little crispy things in a Crunch bar. They just give a little unexpected flavor. Relevant? Lucrative? Oh probably not, but you never know. 

Body paintings to start are the most satisfying form of vandalism in the world. We as people ALWAYS look a certain way or at least operate in a narrow range. The only time we see blue people or green people is in entertainment- when the color is safely on a screen. We also fastidiously avoid mess-making as adults. We are trained to always clean clean clean (and don't get me wrong; I clean like a little monster). We, not at all unlike children, need to make deliberate, unconfined messes from time to time. I cannot begin to explain the satisfaction of being well dressed and watching the ratified shock on people's faces when they see me drag a handful of bright, permanent, crimson paint across my face, hair and clothes. THE BEST.

I'm about to be thirty. No idea how the hell that happened. I mentally stopped at about seventeen for sure. So time is flying. There are two points I'm getting at:

1.) Time is short. Feel as alive as possible all the time. Bleed if you have to. Or paint your body. OR let me paint your body.

2.) Embrace your inner child, because I can confirm as a thirty year old that you don't or shouldn't lose your inner child as an adult. You only build upon it. As an adult, I am firmly persuaded that it becomes more and more important to protect, cultivate and curate your inner child to be a wise and joyful adult. Basically it doesn't work the way that we thought it did, so do some (legal) juvenile stuff. It's important.

Now I guess the blessed peeps following my work can feel that energy and that freedom coming off of the body paintings that I do, because I'm getting lots of attention and positive feedback as a result.

Moral of that story is follow you instincts. We override our guts so often as adults because LOGIC. Logic is friend and enemy, yo. Sometimes- often in my case- my subconscious has processed both thought and emotion faster and more thoroughly than my conscious and it pays to listen to that. Even when it doesn't make sense on the front end. Especially when it doesn't make sense on the front end.

I've got a HELLA long way yet to go, but if I've learned anything, I've definitely confirmed that one.

Follow your noses, peeps. Don't repress. If you really want to connect with your creativity and inner child in a fresh and inspiring way, reach out to me about one of these transformative sessions!