Seeing

I am a frustrated artist. No, let me rephrase that. I am a person who'd like to be an artist but can't seem to produce stuff that satisfies me. Painting or writing. And its crazy-making. I suddenly thought; "What if I'm wasting my time here? What if I'm like the sad souls that try out for Idols, thinking they have singing talent, when they clearly don't? What a shocking waste of time, effort, emotion and energy!" Just because you want to do something well, obviously doesn't mean that you will be able to. Those poor people are a public proof of that. Without giving up altogether on the whole creative thing, I have decided to take a different route for a while. Its been amazing. Before, when I saw anything beautiful, I would immediately inwardly try to work out how I could reproduce it. Either in paints or words: How can I recreate this? How could I get quite that colour? What words would best capture that moment? Now, I am a spectator. An applauder An admirer . . . Instead of almost critiquing beauty for my own ends, I am free to have my breath taken away by it. Literally. Sometimes, I feel as though I will explode Just looking Just absorbing Just wonder filled. I don't know if this will be permanent Or whether the creative urge will resurface. I don't know whether this new way of looking has anything to do with it - but nature has suddenly becoming luminous with beauty And seeing it, for now, has become more than enough. I just love the way I can relax into it And really be there Without any sense of needing to hold on to the moment by expressing it again By my own, necessarily lesser, efforts.