It sits on your chest, wraps itself around your lungs, suffocates your bones, makes your muscles rattle and your mind lost in the depths of all the how's, what's, whys, when's and can I's?
It clouds your thinking, that once semi positive, determined, strong mind set, confuses itself. The need to get through the day, tackle life and all the things it can throw at you while quietly worrying about the decline of your mentality, because history...... A history that tells you, this is not going to end well, whilst being fearful of saying such things aloud as not to put that fear into those around you too.
I have enough experiences under my belt now to know logically that I can go through the challenges and raw emotions whilst not feeding into old patterns and behaviours, but I have more that tells me the contrary, emotionally speaking. A body full of scars, an appetite loss from stress that can very easily feed into disordered eating's way of thinking (pardon the pun), more than a decade full of psych ward admissions, suicide attempts and eventually, the scariest part, psychosis Those knocks on the door that didn't happen, the buildings and faces warping and disfigured, the shadowy figures in your peripherals, thinking you hear somebody shouting your name when they haven't, is this it? is this where I begin to drown in it all again, are these the signs of another time where "I just can't"....... NO! I can't, it can't, this cannot be that, not again, please not again.
And so you paint, it sounds ridiculous I know, all that to be counteracted by one action, but its not one action, its many, shrouded in colour. Its being present, It's expressing instead of internalising, its releasing all that sits within you instead of inhibiting, its embracing that darkness instead of squashing it and letting it eat you up.
Its acceptance of all you can't control, letting what you can, go. It's visualising the feelings in shape and colour and smudges and splats and mess, a representation of all that's inside, coming out, so its real, so you can see it, so you can validate it and comfort it. Sometimes its painting all of that and painting your counter arguments and positivity amongst it to bring balance. It's getting through the minutes, hours, days, weeks or months, hoping the more you do that, the more likely it will be that eventually the darkness will lighten again, the weight will lighten again, It's hope.
Its turning all the trauma, all the triggers, all the stress and worry and pain and upset into something you can connect with outwardly, and for others that seems to connect too. Into something that speaks instead silently screaming, something that opens conversations and sometimes encourages others to find their own version of creativity that feeds the soul, it's healing.
I'm healing and that is in no way linear, its beautiful and powerful but its also scary and ugly and sometimes feels bloody impossible but I have art, I have expression and I have creativity.
My paintings will tell that story, My exhibition will tell that story because after all, I am human.
Forever chaotic but also healing.
Zoe Siobhan.
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