on Being Deliberate

IMAG0965, originally uploaded by Sara Everett.

The swing of things has begun to return. Yet there still is this sense of satisfied completeness. This trip was something I needed to do for such a long time and now that I'm back I feel I'm truly "back". Not really wistful or yearning to still be in a dream-like residency, but eager to push forward. I'm finding myself in continual little attempts to keep the flavor of my time at Clo Ceardlann however while I transition back into "normal" life:
Waking up slow, sipping tea constantly, journaling my dreams and taking moments to watercolor.
But it runs deeper. Somewhere along the lines of interaction with artists I met: Ian Joyce, Oona Hyland, Eoin Mac Lochlainn, Nuala ni Fhlathuin, Bil Fleming... I ignited a spark to dig deep. To plant my heels into the roots of my vision and speak my voice with more deliberateness. With a honed sense of what my art wants to say.
I picked up an appreciation for working slower. There was a 20x30" wood block carving took me several weeks of carving a little piece of it each day until my arm was tired. It seemed for a time that I never would finish it. But then it was done. The pure satisfaction of running my fingers across it's grooves and lines was bliss. And the printing of it spawned a series.
I'm thinking in patterns now. In the happiness of long projects and the limitlessness of three dimensions and unrestrained media. I can better appreciate the connections now between a thumbed through, dog-eared stack of books, the ramblings of my scrawled journal pages, conversations I have and the little inspirations of daily life. It all circles around into artwork.
A continuous, self-sustaining circle of refining and honing. Each time I think I've completed an answer with my artwork only more questions appear. The only thing to do is to keep pushing.