I never fit in my family and my heart goes out to my poor mother who had this gangly, ungainly, iconoclastic tomboy for a daughter. I passionately questioned everything, rebelled always, embraced socialism (my father’s family had escaped communist Russia), and feminism, while protesting the war. I was born an artist and I think, by nature, most artists are different. We seem to be wired for the lives we must live in order to make our art.
I spent my childhood and, truth be told, a lot of my adult years feeling unacceptable, being different, although I seemed successful on the surface. I finally quit trying to push my square-peg self into the always-round hole but it took hemorrhaging to get me there. I needed something that dramatic because I was so clouded in my beliefs about who I was and what I wanted. But little by little I glimpsed me. I tasted my truth. I started to live, to be.
In her book, Women Who Run With the Wolves, Clarrisa Pinkola Estes tells the most heart-rending version of the Ugly Duckling story I’ve ever heard. This poor creature, a swan hatched in the nest of a duck, is alien from the very beginning. He is deemed ugly because he’s not like anybody else. He is picked on mercilessly until even his mother tires of defending him and he is forced to leave his home in a form of exile. He has nowhere to go. There is no place of nurture. He faces danger and even death as he moves from pond to pond just trying to survive.
The message he has received and internalized is there’s something wrong with HIM. He believes this will be true no matter how hard he tries to change it. The possibility he’s just fine exactly as he is, but has not yet found where he belongs, never crosses his mind; belonging is so utterly outside of his experience.
This is the way it was with me I think. I always assumed I was at fault for being different. It never occurred to me I was just out of place. On an unconscious level I bent and shape-shifted, trying to be one of them, endeavoring to please. It wasn’t so much that I denied my truth but, rather, I didn’t know it yet. Like the ugly duckling, I’d been born into what I wasn’t. I had no idea there was another way. I just knew I wasn’t a very good duck but I tried and tried to be.
When we deny our own truths, when we don’t know who we are, what we fail to realize is this hides us from our own. The more false and hidden we become, often even from ourselves, the less likely it is we will ever find our place. Some of us get lost, as I did for 26 years.
But here is the thing: As much as we may want to be acceptable outside of ourselves, we never will be until we find what we belong to within. We are asked to be who we were born to be, to spend our whole lives, if necessary, discovering what that is. It’s really a deep journey of the soul—a coming to awareness and then acceptance of self.
So my exile is self-imposed, as much as it may feel otherwise, and until I see, truly see, my own beauty and worth, there is no answer for me. But when I come out of hiding and love myself exactly as I am, when I celebrate the individual who does question and rebel and can sometimes be difficult and scared, once I see her true place in the family of things, something very beautiful happens: I become willing to be found.
When I rise up and spread my wings with the sheer joy of being, it becomes a beacon of sorts, calling out to mine, and my swans will come. Like the duckling when he is finally united with his kind and is recognized and loved naturally and easily, I will be home.
Love to you all,
Jeane
You are found…you are now giving others ways to find themselves:) AMEN and so it is:)
Thanks Grace. Yes, I do feel found but, almost every day, I get lost yet again, am humbled, and have to find my way back. It’s such a rich and beautiful process!
I totally understand this blog for this describes me to a tee. I don’t know who I am; having been raised in a foster home that gave false love, no guideness to the harshness of life. The only time I feel myself and it is only a little of myself for I’ve never delved into it too deeply or long enough, is when I’m painting. It is my world and mine alone to discover. This is why I must get back to doing it again and sustaining it to permanancy to truly find myself; my place in what we call life.
It will not ome quickly for I know I will have to discover me in pieces, one journey at a time for it is deeply hidden, buried deep somewhere, never truly to have ever been unveiled. Who knows what I will find there, but find it I will because only then will I have a true sense of peace; finally knowing who I am and truly feel that I belong somewhere in this place we call life. I will finally feel I belong to something sustainable.
Self discovery is such an amazing journey and, I agree with you, it takes place over all the days and years of our lives–a process of peeling one layer after another, always finding yet another layer. Making art is the path to self for many of us. It’s why art has the power to heal. I started to reclaim my art and life almost 15 years ago now and I’m happy to say I have found peace. I wish it for you. Pick up those brushes and let the rest fall into place.
Yes I agree that art does have the power to heal and I know it will help me out in the process of peeling one layer after another until the final layer of peace. Thank you for your words and so much for starting this blog project for all of us out there that comfort from it! I am so glad and thankful for finding you. You have helped me understand/review a lot of things in my life from reading your blogs! Keep up the great work that you do and I will be picking up those brushes so that things can start to fall into place. I have also ordered the book “The Artist’s Way” by Julia Cameron. Let the process begin =)
That is GREAT news! YAY! Yes, let the process begin and keep me posted as it does. Under the Artistic Process tab you might read (in this order, if you haven’t already) 1. A Little Help From My Friends 2. Today’s the Day! Beginning to Paint (Again) 3. Back to the Studio 4. How I Found Motivation to Paint 5. Shifting Gears on a Snow Day
6. Creativity’s Dark Side and 7. Painting Progresses. You are not in this alone 🙂
I loved this Jeane! I never fit either. I remember the Christmas my mother finally gave me a great flannel shirt instead frilly underwear or pyjamas. It was a first…fleeting ….moment of acceptance. I remember my mother saying I was like my father (and not in a complimentary tone) and vice versa. But…from what I’ve read, it seems like you’ve found your place. I think I’m getting there.
Well, I think the trick is to find our place within ourselves because the OUTSIDE is always changing. But, yes, I’m finally beginning to feel some healthy self-acceptance which is helping with all the rest. And it’s true that this piece of land I live on is paradise to me.
Wow..as I read this I felt like I had written it. Thank you for this as I never truly knew someone else felt as I did. Where you say ” Like the ugly duckling, I’d been born into what I wasn’t. I had no idea
there was another way. I just knew I wasn’t a very good duck but I tried
and tried to be” I can really relate. I never was “bad” but I wasn’t as everyone else and I am 25 now and finally starting to see I don’t have to be…and perhaps that is where my freedom is. It does sound like you’re finding your place. I hope I do too.
You absolutely can find your place. I’m 61 years old and it has taken me the better part of all those years to find where I belong. Dive in. Start questioning. Find what you belong to. If you haven’t read these two posts, they might be helpful: http://high-road-artist.com/7324/wisdom-wednesdays/the-ugly-duckling/ and http://high-road-artist.com/7795/wisdom-wednesdays/core-meanings-of-the-ugly-duckling/.
Many never see themselves. Only a more evolved few. It is our own hearts we know the least of.
And what, I believe, we are here to discover.