The Joy of Mining Images

The Joy of Mining Images

A big piece of Joy for me is mining images.

I am still going through boxes from storage, even though I moved in here over 4.5 years ago. Every box of papers that I bring in has to be gone through and filed (Most of it goes in the big round file marked “recycle”). It’s a bit of a stretch to find the Joy in that job. A big piece of Joy that does stem from that job, though, is mining images.

I have been doing art all of my life. I have lots and lots of old sketchbooks, paintings, ideas and photos. Years ago I took yet another photography class so that I could figure out how to create my big .5mm pencil drawings using photographs and darkroom magic instead, in a sort of chemical montage process that I was inventing. I had to back away from the project when I got pregnant as there was no way I would risk my babies health with exposure to a toxic chemical soup.

When computers came to be more available, I kept imagining that there would be a way to create my vision with them. Years later now with a scanner, a digital camera, Illustrator and Photoshop and Painter, the tools available for my palette are so far more sophisticated than anything I could have imagined back then. I am so grateful for programmers and technology! YES!

So I mine images in my files, redraw or repaint them, add pieces, cut out pieces, scan or photograph them, pull them into Photoshop or Painter and have at it, emerging in a short while from the instantaneous creative flow with another jewel to add to the treasure of images I have available for my work. What a joy!

A few samples of prints created from images that I have mined in this way include: Fanny, Kady, and Remembrance:

Fanny - a mined image print
Kady - a mined image composite print
Remembrance - a mined image digital collage

What Kind of Joy?

In my book, there’s joy and there’s JOY.

The first arises spontaneously out of doing something I enjoy: preparing raw food, hiking in the woods on a brilliant spring day, or creating custom illustrations for someone’s book. It’s a great feeling, and I encourage it as much as possible throughout my schedule. This kind of joy can also come from a particular situation I find myself in, like being lauded by friends, getting the opportunity to truly serve someone, or coming upon a field of gorgeous flowers. This is circumstantial joy.

JOY, on the other hand is direct from Spirit. It matters not what the circumstance, JOY keeps bubbling up. I see it as an artesian well, constantly bubbling over into every experience I have – “good” or “bad”. This is a gift from God, letting me know that I am indeed doing diligence, paying attention enough to maintain conscious connection. Once I opened to True Source I was flooded with it. There is nothing else as sweet, except when, like two hands connected by the heart I experience both joy and JOY together. Ah! Now that is another word: BLISS.

May all of your days contain extensive moments of Bliss!

Joy is a Fountain in my Heart

Many, many years ago I was first starting on another path toward living my life in integrity with my spiritual self when I came into an inspired epiphany: that I could choose how I experience my life. Simply put, no matter what it is that I am walking through, I could choose what my outlook would be, what my perceptions of it would be, what I experience. It occurred to me that I could metaphorically “get a new pair of glasses” to have a new view of the same landscape.

I decided then that I choose joy! I could be scrubbing the porcelain repository with anger or miserable victim thoughts, or I could be scrubbing the same vessel while singing and giving thanks for my health that I could accomplish the feat. It is ok either way. I still get a clean bathroom. So, I decided to sing at it. I decided that I would dance through the grocery store, and that I would love what I do and do what I love.

We’ve all heard the saying, “calling the glass half full, or half empty.” I knew that then, but somehow getting that I could choose joy really turned my experience of my life around. So, when I am doing things that just don’t feel good at all, I still work on putting on my joy glasses. And when I get to do things that make my heart soar like creating a really superb graphic or writing a song, the joy part is easy.