One step closer to getting done. gotta get myself in the art-making habit… I know that if I don’t make art on a regular (if not daily) basis, I become sluggish, bored, depressed and useless. I’ll keep updating as I progress on this painting.

btw – the look I’m going for is my art journaling crossed with traditional iconography. I think it’s going to be great.

I will not be going back to her blog again but I still feel I need to express my opinion. Without linking to this lady’s blog, I will just say her post was on how to deal with fear. Her solution was to replace the fear feeling with a better feeling – love. And that was it.  Supposedly writing down what you’re afraid of, then thinking of something/one you love should make the fear drift away and give you a feeling of confidence.

I hope I’m not the only one willing to cry bull on this. If you’re genuinely seeking to deal with your fears, this is just like sticking a big ol’ smiley face on a car wreck and walking away while people are dying in the wreck. Sure, you made it look happy (?) but the people are still dying. That may be stretching it, but if you mask your fear, shove it aside, or stuff it way down deep, you haven’t dealt with it and it will rear its ugly head again.

So here’s my way of dealing with fear:

1. Write down what I’m afraid of. For example, I may be afraid of making that big leap into self-employment.
2. Next to that, write down why I’m afraid. Am I afraid because I won’t be earning anything initially and am worried about the bills? Am I scared because I don’t know how to get started? Or is it because I’m really afraid of failure?
3. Now that I know WHY I’m afraid of whatever it is that I’m afraid of, I can attack each reason with fact, truth and practical ways to deal with my concerns.  I’ll take one of the reasons in step 2 for example: If I’m afraid because I don’t know how to start, I should find a mentor, go to my local Small Business Association, read books, ask questions. I should research until I’m comfortable with how to proceed.
4. My fear is now conquered. Mostly.*

I understand some of this is a little over-simplified but it sure as hell beats “think happy thoughts” as the way to conquer fear. A positive outlook on life is essential &emdash; I will not deny that, however the Pollyannaish stuff that’s coming out of self-help “gurus” is so not helpful. Deal with your problems or they’ll deal with you.

*There is something to be said about resistance. It’s a powerful force and I hope to one day overcome my own resistance to action. Read Art & Fear for a treatise on resistance.

All is well, really… well, besides being knocked on my arse since last Friday by this stinkin’ virus. I’m working on a new web project for a new client, I’m developing a new class called “Visual Journaling for the Intimidated,” which will be an in-person class at first and will be online in a while. I’m working on a new blog and watching the hubster play the stock market to earn us some dough for our trip to Greece in September. So far so good!

Link Love Mondays will be back next week.

Happy Dance:

Getting Through “teh suck”:

Here are some juicy links to start out your week:

How to Create a Custom Apple iPhone Website Icon, If you want to link your blog to check on comments while you’re afk or if you’ve developed your own iPhone Web App, here’s how to make your own icon so it’ll show up nice n’ pretty like the others on your iPhone.

Akashiya Sai Watercolor Brush Pen from Jet Pens. These look like they’d be fun to use in my journals.

Jing is free & only saves in SWF which can be problematic. It links up with Screencast.com, a paid service to store and share slideshows & such. I like Jing’s no-frills interface and cross-platform-ness but I really dislike the file format and the fact that they seem to be in bed with Screencast.

The other screen capture program that looks promising (and is only $9 until July 4th 2008), is Sequence by a French company called App4Mac. It’s still in Beta but at $9 it’s a steal. It’s crashed on my mac a couple times and the way to end your recording isn’t as intuitive as I’d like but it works & works well – and saves as a Quicktime Movie so you can edit it in iMovie.

So here are a few links from my web explorations last week – a little scattered, no theme like last time:

Theo Ellsworth is a self-taught artist and in his words:

He has a miniature city inside of his head that is overrun with funny monsters, yet he still manages to come across as a semi-normal guy.

I’ve been trying to get in touch with him via email all last week since I want to get a hold of some of his books, but his inbox is apparently full. So I broke down and went all old-school – used paper, pen and a stamp.

Plurk – If you need another social whosawhatsit, this is one of the newest (to me at least) and possibly most addicting (yes, more addicting than Twitter) one out there. You not only can follow your friends’ plurks, but you can respond to them and see others’ response as well. You earn “Karma” points for doing things like Plurking something interesting, having people respond to your Plurks, using photos, videos or emoticons in your Plurks. You can also get different colored stars for recruiting people to Plurk (yes, the link to Plurk is one that’ll get me stars…).Yay for another time sink.

Five Plants to Repel Mosquitoes. I have the perfect yard for breeding mosquitoes. Every summer they swarm in droves and they’re so tough, they eat DEET. My plan for the next time I actually get out of the house is to buy some of these supposedly mosquito-repelling plants and put them on my deck.  I would love to go outside and not be afraid of being carried away and sucked dry by those nasty little vampires.