where does inspiration come from?

I recently picked up the book the Women Who Run With the Wolves by Clarissa Pinkola Estes to read a second time. I read this book before I became a mama and before I became a quilter. It introduced me to the world of archetypes and has had an immense impact on my subject matter over the years without me even realizing it.

What is an archetype?

 According to Dictionary.com an archetype is: The original pattern or model from which all things of the same kind are copied or on which they are based; a model or first form; a prototype. In Jungian psychology it is a collectively inherited unconscious idea, pattern of thought, image, etc., universally present in individual psyches.

Almost all the quilts in my goddess series are inspired by different women archetypes and their stories.

I lean on the myths of many cultures to relate the stage of my life I am in and the part of myself I am working on.

I study the stories of goddesses, archetypes, saints and everyday women.  They become my model, my idea.

I often discover they were already a part of my psyche unknown to me until I start thinking about why their story stands out to me.

Naturally, I embellish a bit to make their story my own, but I try to always honor the integrity of the original story when there is one.

I may combine many stories into one.

I may only use a very small portion of a story and make it my own.

I try very hard to relay their story through me, through my hands, through my stitches, and tell it through my experience.

And how this changes me and my story…

I better understand why stories have meaning to us and why we share our stories with others.

I see how the stories of the past paint our future and how whether we are aware of it or not how they influence our psyches. Every story we hear, every story we tell, every story we read changes us and changes our perceptions.

This is my inspiration for what I do. 

I want to change my perceptions.

I want to love without judgments.

I want to leave the stories that no longer serve me behind and rewrite my story.

I want to be strong and wise.

Stories and archetypes that teach these lessons to me are my inspiration.

What inspires you?

Monkey Seeds

A good friend of mine who only recently returned from India stopped by my house to visit. He told me his tale and exploits of his journey with all the energy and electricity you would expect out of a westerner in a strange land doing strange things eating strange foods and the such. Upon his departure, he with only the best intentions stowed upon a small brown bag of monkey seeds. I was both grateful that he thought so much of me to smuggle such a contraband through customs and god knows what hiding places and also a bit puzzled at why he would go to such great lengths. "Thank you," says me, "Bright blessings on your house this day."

I should not bore you with the planting and germination process that goes into monkey seeds, but it is not complicated as monkeys are not complicated life forms.

Moving on to the now. In this now, I have a life. I say life because they are present in the yard and in the house. They stow away in the cars, in bed themselves in every aspect of our life. I'm sure there is a Buddhist lesson on compassion or impermanence somewhere here, but for the life of me, I cannot see it. All I see are monkeys. Lots and lots of monkeys.

They all didn't seed out at the same time. No, there are monkeys of all different sizes and more possibly still in a state of germination. The small ones mostly fell pray to the cats, but cat tummys are only so large and can only hold so many monkeys. The small ones quickly grow to become big ones. If you have never been in the company of monkeys or heard the myth they throw feces. Well, it is true to the fullest. It is true monkeys love nothing more than hurling feces at just about anything moving or stationary. I think there is no evolutionary mechanism going on. It is just good fun to throw feces and not just their feces, but all feces; dogs, cats, and even your feces if you are not quick with flush and disposal. I would make here a reference to monkeys and bad room mates, but I will leave the bad roommate reference to children. Children even though messy have a redeeming quality about them. Monkeys do not. You would not have this many roommates at one time and let us hope not this many children.

Given our families spiritual and moral philosophy we don't kill. We eat meat, but we don't kill. I now realize the hypocritic aspect of this philosophy, but none the less, we don't kill, except scorpions and mosquito's.

So with natural selection and time and patience our only tools, we persevere alongside the monkeys. I guess there is the Buddhist lesson, patience....

HUBB