I always go, go, go. And do and go, and do and go for everyone else, hours upon hours for others. For my family, for my friends, for my clients, I just go and do. Until I’m exhausted, my body aches, and I drop at night. I rarely do something for just me. Until this last week.
After a few crazy months of constantly being on the move for some quick and much-needed funding, I put it all aside and did this thing I’ve dreamt of for a few years. I took the road less traveled for a while.
The entrance to Pointers Ridge. Literally, you take the road less traveled!
I did an art residency with a friend for 4 full days of nothing but creating, talking, silence, arting, being in nature, being nearly unplugged, just reconnecting. No going, unless I wanted. Not doing unless I wanted. It was all on my terms and it was FRIKKEN awesome.
Art is in my blood, my soul and no one can take it away. It heals me and those who come into its path to learn and feel its peace, power, and place in the world.
I’m in this world to create.
And I’m meant to return to Pointers Ridge on a regular basis to go in the direction I’m meant to go in. If you’re lost in a world of “go go go, do do do”, stop it and take a break. Pointers Ridge isn’t just for visual artists, it’s for anyone to create their happy.
Sign up for email at http://www.designbydayle.com and send me a DM if interested in doing a virtual, free creative, one of a kind workshop to help you uncover and work through feelings in a safe space. I will be posting more information on my Facebook page @DayleSundbergArt in the next few days and weeks.
I want to be able to show up in life for my kids and family, and in order to do that I need to take care of my mental health.
Do you know what it looks like when your mental health declines? Fatigue, relationships suffer, isolation, memory loss, confusion, self-harm, prolonged grief, and the list goes on.
Art is my therapy. It does not have to be pretty or understood or look like anything special. It just helps put feelings and emotions that there are no words for, and expessed in color, shapes, and lines where maybe it can help you find the words or the insight to a feeling to help your healing and health journey.
I am doing a FREE virtual/online class doing and inviting you to join in the journey. You do not need any art skills. You just need to show up for an hour or so, with some random paper, colors, colored pencils, watercolors, markers, or whatever is handy for this class.
Interested in using easy art techniques to help you through your journey of those hard feelings, or maybe grief, depression, or struggles in daily life? Leave a comment, or send a DM, sign for email at https://designbydayle.com/classes/
Artists are lonely. We are stereotyped as loners, but are we? We appreciate and see a beautiful sunrise unlike others, we notice everything, or we focus in on one specific thing. Our brains are wired to connect things in a different way. But are we “loners”?
One The Edge – Dayle Sundberg
It is quiet when the sun rises, birds chirping, water rippling, wind rustling, cool air touching your face. Quiet. Peaceful and beautiful, another new day filled with hope. A new day.
“She holds the day in the palm of her hand” – Photo: Dayle Sundberg
It is quiet. But like TOO much quiet. A type of hellish quietness that just continues day after day. An epidemic within a pandemic affecting every age. A type of hellish quietness, also known as loneliness. Maybe you are watching a parent sit alone in a care facility with little to no interaction with the world outside the staff. Maybe you have a young person who should be chasing others at recess, having big birthday parties, attending rite of passages like first dates, Prom, or other cultural events that mark significant points in life. We are missing that connection in the wiring.
It does not take much searching online to find studies and research on the rise in loneliness, or how the past year has affected not only physical health, but mental health. Harvard, the CDC, and others have scary rates of the rise of loneliness, depression, anxiety, and suicide. I could link all the articles for you, however, that would take up pages.
I admit it, I am lonely. It is TO DAMN QUIET. I am an artist, self-proclaimed “loner”, we spend hours upon hours in our own little worlds creating without any disturbances and we get all flubery-busted when someone interrupts for something trivial, like food, water, or sleep.
Working quietly in my studio.
The quietness of being socially distanced is, well a deafening silence. Humans were made for connections and thrive from that connection and intimacy of a relationship. Keep us isolated and things happen, like thoughts that repeat over and over, chewing nails, cutting, over-eating, sleeping too much, binge watching movies, addictions to substances or screens, and the list goes on, but it looks a lot like anxiety, depression, and yep, you guessed it, loneliness. We are un-wired, with connections missing.
Here, but not complete.
Not only are adults feeling it, but young people who are developing social skills needed to become productive adults that shape out future are suffering with it. Because of the obvious risks during the pandemic of needing to social distance, and depending on technology to connect, learn, shop, and interact it has become un-normally normal to be apart. Being physically distanced and separated from other people puts one in a state of physiological stress, and when it continues day after day it can become a chronic condition damaging to your physical and emotional health, according to former (and recently confirmed again) U.S. Surgeon General Vivek Murthy.
“I found that people who struggle with loneliness, that that’s associated with an increased risk of heart disease, dementia, depression, anxiety, sleep disturbances and even premature death,” Dr. Vivek Murthy told NPR.
Now, knowing how art has trained me to be a “loner” and I practiced this loneliness thing in my studio for hours upon hours, I also know how art has helped my mental health. Connecting your thoughts and feelings in your head to paper, canvas, or another media can help one maneuver through the mess of crossed wires in our brains and bodies.
Art helps heal and can bring connections and community together through creating and sharing. I have created a way to help move my dark, deep thoughts from my body to art and create a safe space to share. Art heals. Art re-wires. Art creates connection.
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