the biggest gamble
Sometimes I think it would make all the difference in the world to have one person look me deeply in the eyes and tell me, with all confidence and faith that I am capable of what I have set out to do. And I wonder, would this make the difference that I think it would? I am ashamed of this secret wish, because it is so obviously insecure and superficial. Surely “being” comes from within. Mentally, I recognize this. More deeply, I’m obviously not there yet.
Based on conversations with creative friends, I surmise that anyone in any kind of honest artistic pursuit will at some point battle deeply with their insecurities, both personal and artistic. Maybe one doesn’t have to be a balls-to-the-wall Übermensch to be a great artist. It must help, though.
Despite my lack of emotional confidence in my artistic potential (something I am trying to remedy), I have certainly willed myself to invest in this dream. I have taken the biggest gamble. After failing for years to suppress my impractical artistic aspirations, when I turned 30, I made a conscious and momentous decision to hesitate no further and to boldly leap in the direction of my dreams. I did not have a plan of how to make this happen. I simply started making small decisions daily that seemed like they might be in the right direction. One of the decisions was to finally go to college (I hadn’t yet been) and to study painting. I know from personal experience that, when it comes to art, I am not one of those people who can independently blaze their own path. Is that another shameful admission? Couldn’t this be a sign that I am not a true artist? Regardless, I decided I needed help. And so here I am, enrolled in school, getting into some pretty hefty debt, all based on the slim possibility that one day I may be a great working artist and that this investment will be worth it. When I try to comprehend the potential consequences of this risk fully, I am almost suffocated by doubt and fear. This is not the “safe” route. Surely, I don’t have what it takes and I should quit now, before I get in any further.
Meanwhile, it turns out that deciding to live your dreams is not a leap. Most days, it’s more like scaling a cliff. Each bloody inch, a battle for your life. In order to just pay my daily living expenses I work upwards of 80 hours a week while not in class and at least 40 during a full-time semester. Yet, somehow, I’m entering my second year at school and I’ve managed so far to not quit. This is the hardest thing I’ve ever done and I’m holding nothing back. All my eggs in one teetering basket.
What happens if I fail? It’s a question I am so fearful of, that I really haven’t ventured past its taunting punctuation. Maybe I should. Maybe a thorough examination of the boundaries of failure is what must come next. After all, it is always what is left to the imagination that is the most terrible.