Social anxiety can be invisible too.

 

I love Natalie Dee, she gets it.

Hi, I am Samm and I have social anxiety.

I might look cool, calm and collected on the outside but inside my different I-positions (the different parts of Self) are a cacophony of screams and sobs and rocking. There's a war going on inside me and one side of that war is standing like Anxiety Girl telling me that I got this, I can do this, I'm fine, I'm safe, it's ok, nothing bad is going to happen. The other side is bawling their eyes out, holding their hands over their ears with their eyes scrunched tightly shut, curled up in a ball rocking back and forth, hiding under a blanket fort. That side used to be far louder and more in control than it is these days. I am grateful to acknowledge that my Anxiety Girl in her superheroine pose is definitely becoming stronger and rallying more internal cheerleaders around her to make sure I live my life and do things normal people take for granted.

Something that has intrigued me ever since I began my Bachelor degree in Arts Psychotherapy is how often my peers would tell me that they enjoyed my presentation, that I was so confident. It really juxtaposed my lived experience. It really spotlighted that we can never know what someone is feeling on the inside, what they are going through or dealing with internally, based on how they appear externally.

This is my truth.

As I walk out of my house and get into my car I feel the first twinges of 'butterflies', like pins and needles the size of fat fingers. I feel it in my stomach and around my chest and collarbone. I ground myself; I sink my roots right down into the Earth and draw on my Mother's womb energy. I keep chanting to myself I can do this, I'm fine, It's fine. I'm ok. It will be over soon. I notice my breathing is more shallow than usual and I try to take deep breaths. As I get into my car I let out a guttural, low exhalation and it feels good, it pushes the fat-fingered pins and needles out of my gut momentarily. So I do it a few times as I put on my seatbelt and turn on the car. I pull out of the driveway and that somehow allows my monkey mind to take over so I have to consciously keep reigning it in. There's an insistent jabbering in the back left of my brain telling me to turn around, to go home, you're running late, you hate being late, just turn around, don't go. Only, I'm not really running late. Yes, I did want to leave about 3 minutes earlier than I did but I am by no means running late.

Then there's another voice in my head at the front right saying, it's ok, you've got this, Baby Gurl may have said she doesn't care if you don't go, and maybe she really doesn't, but ultimately she will feel good to see you there, to see you showing up for her. #MummaRepresent

As I pull onto the long street heading toward the high school those fat-fingered pins and needles kick it up a notch. They are more like little mosquitoes of electricity zapping around through my body. I can feel my pulse like a ring around my upper neck threatening to choke me, to take my breath away but I keep going. I keep going because my Baby Gurl is going up on stage to receive an award for doing really well at school and she has her own anxiety about that and I am grateful to hear she has changed her wording and has been calling it excitement. I like to think I had something to do with that, when I told her that anxiety is just excitement of a different colour, it's just one step down from excitement so if you can step up that anxiety then perhaps it can become excitement. She's been talking herself into it and I love that. I love that so much and I really do hope that is my influence. Yet still, I know there is anxiety underlying the excitement, I know it because I feel it and if she can get up on the stage and receive her award - a thing she was begging me not to make her do a week ago - then I sure as shit can get over myself long enough to walk into that school and go watch her.

By the time I get out of the car my whole jaw is buzzing with electricity and my mouth has a metallic taste in it. My stomach is roiling and my shoulders feel so tense. I can barely catch my breath. My mouth is dry. I've lost a lot of my peripheral vision at this point. But can you tell? If you were observing me, could you tell any of this was going on inside me?

No.

No, you couldn't because I look just fine on the outside. I have some colour to my cheeks and my eyes might be a little wider than usual and perhaps I speak a little faster and I seem like I am out of breath (because I am) but only a very observant person who truly knows me would pick up on that stuff. On the outside I am fine. I am cool. I am calm. I am collected. I am confident. -- would you look at that, all words beginning with c. I am the 4 c's, the four seas, hmmm feels like an art journal spread there. I do love a good metaphor.

My daughter comes racing out the hall doors as I arrive. Was she waiting for me? Was she watching for me? How did she know I was walking up to the doors? I don't know but I'm glad she came out. She was a lifeline. She was an anchor. She was a reminder of why I was putting myself through this physiological and psychological torture. It is all for her. She is a billion times worth it because you know what, she was there ready and waiting for me. So it WAS important that I show up for her. She DID really want me there regardless of saying she didn't care. She did and I showed up for her.

"I have dry anxiety mouth," I say to her.

"Me too!" she says to me.

We hug and she walks me inside.

Julia Michaels sings it perfectly.

It didn't take long for my anxiety to ebb once I was seated and I no longer had to be seen, I could hide in my seat. I didn't have to do anything. I didn't have to get up and perform. I didn't have to go on stage. I didn't have to pretend to be socially capable or hide my social unacceptability (I'm not exactly a mainstream muggle).  So once I was seated, I grounded myself again and it was ok and I was almost out of the whole situation. School presentations are boring AF, by the way. I got to see my daughter on stage for a blip of time and the rest was trying not to fidget or go on my phone to pass the time. In the end, she came up and gave me a hug and then I got to go home.

That is just a taste of my anxiety. Any time I have to leave the house there is at least an element of this in me. It might only be some gentle butterfly whispers or it might be a roaring so loud in my ears that I can't hear people talking but it's always there. I wish it would go away. I wish I didn't have to feel it. I wish that in order to LIVE my life rather than just survive it, I didn't have to force myself to go through this all the time. But it is there. And I live with it. And it's invisible to the naked eye.

I share this for those out there who need to know they aren't alone. Those who need validation for their feelings. Those who need to hear that someone else gets it. I get it. I am right here with you. We just keep putting one foot in front of the other and taking as many deep breaths as we can and we get through it. I see you as you see me.

In Joy

This too shall pass.

 My life is pretty good, all things considered. There's only one real sticking factor that I just can't seem to shift my energy away from mostly because I'm doing what I can to make the situation better but the doing takes TIME. This leaves me stuck in the situation for a period of time even though I'm working on making it better and that is incredibly frustrating.

So I pulled some cards today focusing on this situation that I'm feeling stuck in, that I'm feeling victimised from really. I hate to admit that, as I do not like to feel like a victim but when you're doing everything in your power to make a thing better but the better takes time and effort to happen and in the meantime, you're stuck where you are, then I think maybe, just this once, it's ok to feel like a victim. As long as I do not dwell there, as long as I do not get stuck there, I think it's ok to just feel that for a moment because it's real and it's there and I deeply believe it is healthy to FEEL what we're feeling because the only way past the feeling is to go through it.

I love oracle cards because they are gentler than tarot. Tarot can be a little bit of tough love and while tough love can be good and useful, I was raised under an umbrella of tough love, so as an adult, I prefer a gentler, softer, more supportive and collaborative kind of love. So this is why I tend to choose the oracles over the tarot. The tarot tends to tell me what I already know in a roll-your-eyes kind of way. While the oracle often tells me what I need to hear in a cheer-you-on kind of way. The oracle let's me know "You Got This!" while the tarot tends to say "Would You Just...!!". 

I may have scoffed a little with the cards I pulled. I had that moment of, well duh, I know all this, it's not useful, it's not helpful. Then I stopped and thought, why am I expecting the cards to help? That's not actually what they do. They are messengers that's all. They aren't helpers. They are supporters who often state the obvious or already known but is clearly the reminder needed. To be told what you already know is validating I guess. In that the cards say, listen, we know you know this but maybe you're not trusting yourself, maybe you're not trusting the process, maybe you are being impatient, maybe you feel like giving up or giving in when what you need to do is just keep going. Sometimes they can warn us of a potential danger or impending crash but for the most part the cards are really just validating what we already know or even wish we didn't know.

Thus, I first felt a little jaded by the reading and then appreciated it for what it was. Because I am feeling stuck and while I know I'm getting somewhere, it is slow going and often feels like I'm not getting anywhere but this reading asked me to stop with that crap and look at the bigger picture. The bigger picture is, this is just a moment in my lifetime. This too shall pass. This is a mere road bump in the journey of life and I will get through this, I will pass this section of the road. My commitment is being tested, do I keep travelling on this road or do I take a detour or a side road? Do I keep going? How committed am I to where this road is leading? Or do I want to hang around and stay stagnant for a while longer? It's asking me, what do I want? Do I really want this new life I'm working toward? Because my hard work is definitely paying off. If I stay committed, all my hard work is leading me to a different life where my current situation will ease.

This reading definitely feels like it is encouraging me to keep going. I'm almost there and while it has been dark for a long time now, the work is being done, the roots have been spread out to give a solid foundation and the light is almost upon me.

So if you're reading this, as not many people read my non-arty posts now that the blog-along is over, the cards are meant for you too. The message is meant for you too. In sharing this, I am trusting anyone who reads this post needs to hear this message as much as I do. You are almost there. Keep going. Keep pushing. Keep trusting. Keep working toward those goals because this moment in time shall pass.

In Joy!

The Fucking Honest Oracle Cards

 You probably shouldn't read this post if you get offended by swearing! Although why you would be reading MY blog posts if swearing offended you is beyond me anyway. Not that I swear a lot, nowhere near as much as some people, but I am definitely a swear bear. I've always believed in teaching my children not to say certain words rather than having to parent myself not to say them in front of the kids! Although, at the end of the day, once I get over the initial shock factor of a kid swearing, I realise it's just a word. It doesn't have any power unless we give it power. Yet words do have power don't they. The words we say to ourselves have so much power. The words we say to our children, co-workers, friends, family... they all have incredible power. As they say, the pen is mightier than the sword and why is that? Because words can be used as weapons. They can also be used as a soothing balm. They can create or destroy worlds. But I digress...

Look what I got!!

I couldn't resist!! I am a collector of oracle cards and tarot decks. I have well over 20 of them and am always adding to the collection. I love cards, as in playing cards. I love to shuffle. I also love art and symbology and even more than that, I love meaning-making. I am fascinated by the cards. The symbology I find in the art, the feel of them falling from one hand to the other and how accurate they can be. Sometimes gratingly so. Sometimes they just tell you what you already know, amiright? Other times they tell you EXACTLY what you need to hear. Other times they simply validate you or help you finally make the decision you've been chewing on.

I saw these at The Inappropriate Gift Co and I had to add them to my collection. Every now and then I love a little bit of 'tell it like it is #nofilter' type communication. I had a look through some of the cards though and some of them seem pretty specific. So it will be interesting to see how they play out. I have played with them once so far though and it was pretty accurate, though I could be biased.

I was thinking about having to go to my daughter's award ceremony tomorrow. She's getting an award for having put in such a good effort in school so far this year. I am so incredibly proud of her. I've always made an effort to show up to the kids special school things, like book parade and the easter bonnet parade and if they get an award. Normally, their father is working but since COVID he pretty much works at home all the time now and so, he's coming. If I never have to see that human again in person it will be too soon. When we went to mediation I asked for a shuttle session because my heart and soul just could not bare to sit in the same space as him. So there is a huge part of me struggling right now. I have this internal war going on. Go! Don't go! Go! Don't go! So I shuffled the cards with him on my mind and this situation on my mind and well, that's what I got. His go-to setting is definitely being a Dick.

I had already been self-talking about how he doesn't get to stop me from showing up for my Baby Gurl. He doesn't get to scare me away just because I don't want him to see me. If for some strange reason he sits next to me, I do not have to engage. I can politely say Hello and then nothing else. That is possible. Sure, I will be sitting in discomfort for about an hour but it's worth it to show up for my daughter who is really anxious about having to go up on stage to receive her award. So it didn't really surprise me when I also pulled this card about if I should go or not:

I mean, I had pretty much already decided I was definitely going. This was just validating my choice for me. I have to say I love these cards and am truly looking forward to adding them into the rotation!

What are your favourite cards? I'd love to know!

Mother's Day.

 I find myself with nothing to write about today. The woman who was told as a child that she could talk under water has nothing to say? How can this be? I always have something to say. I always have an opinion about something, yet today I feel this vast emptiness in my head like putting your ear up to a shell.

I think it is partly because I find myself in one of those limbo moments. The calm in the eye of the storm. The last first trimester of my uni degree is done and I am about to go on my 5-day intensive Voice & Sound elective this coming week and when they say intensive, I'm expecting it to be intense! Then I will be heading straight into my second placement, which I'm hoping to do at a beautiful place that caters to pregnant women and new parents. I have so many ideas for art therapy processes I had to make a Word document. I'm excited to get it done. I'm hoping it will bring me paid work, I'm so tired of always stressing about money.

It's Mother's Day today, so I wish all mother's everywhere a beautiful day. Mother's Day isn't one of those holidays that feels particularly special or worthy of much to me. I am a mother every single day, so every day I'm with my kids is mother's day. I am estranged from my own mother, though I do wish her a very blessed mother's day, wherever she is and whatever she is doing. Our relationship was a tumultuous one and when I was already in a toxic marriage, I simply did not have the bandwidth to have to deal with a second relationship that required me to walk on eggshells waiting for the next bitchslap. So I made the difficult and brave decision to cut her out of my life. I miss her. I miss my mother.

I did not grow up with her. I was raised by my father's parents and I didn't really meet my mother again until I was 9 years old, after she left when I was 2. I eventually ran away to live with her when I was a teenager and I thought all my wishes and dreams had been answered. Alas, that was not the case. I won't get into the details of our tumultuous relationship but needless to say, I never felt good enough with her. I always felt like a burden or an afterthought or second best to my younger sister. My mother probably thinks I hate her, because I cut her out of mine and my children's lives but I don't. I love her, I love her very much and I truly do wish her happiness and fulfilment and all that she desires to experience in this lifetime, just not a relationship with me. Once my kids are older she is free to pursue a relationship with them if she desires but for now, it's safer for us all to not have her in our lives.

Yet for me, I don't know. I love my kids and I love that they love me but there is something rather ordinary about Mother's Day for me. I'm not sure what it is. Perhaps that has something to do with my lack of anything to write about today but I'm still writing because I am still committed to writing a blog post every day if I can. I might need to pre-write a few before Friday when my 5-day intensive starts. While I may have a lot to write about on those days, I may not have the time. I'm not used to being out of the house that much so it's going to drain me pretty epically no doubt.

That's all for today, I think. Remember to breathe. Remember to be gentle with yourself. Remember you are worthy, you are lovable and you are loved.

In Joy!

B-deeba-deeba that's all folks!

 I mean, other than the front cover, my Sketchbook from the Sketchbook Project is done! It's taken me just over four months to do, with a bit of a Uni-is-too-full-on-to-do-anything hiatus in the middle. It's been an interesting journey and while you can't see it by flipping through the book from start to finish, I went on little trends where the spreads would have a similar feel but they were all so spread out in the book I think it all evens out in the end. So here are the last few pages:

I couldn't do a book of quotes without letting a little bit of my hippy-dippy shine. I may have missed the free-loving hippy era but it definitely runs through my veins. This is a cute little hippy digistamp coloured of course with my Copic markers. This one is pasted on the back of one of the bits of scrapbook paper I sewed into the book and because it was a dark paper I had to do the writing in white, which wasn't so easy for me. There isn't a lot of forgiveness with white writing. I also used some other colourful posca pens to help give the page a bit of much-needed colour.

This one isn't actually a page of the Sketchbook! In the sketchbook I have two little pockets, just to add a bit of interest and in one of the pockets, I put a card. This is actually on the back of the card! Another cute little digistamp girl coloured in Copic and I used my trusty black posca and green sparkly Sakura gel pens for the writing.

Last but very much not least is this one. Decided on a bit of a goth feel and existential quote. While this might be the very last page I did, it's actually the very first page in the book! I think I quite like this quote for the very first quote of the book. As usual, the digistamp was coloured in Copic and the writing is done with my black posca and some white Uniball Signo dogs on the words. I also outlined the big words in red glittery Sakura gel pen.

As each of these also use digistamps from The Paper Shelter and the theme for their challenge this week is 'colour it' I thought I would enter and see if I can win some more amazing digistamps! I know that most people use digistamps to create beautiful cards; however, I use them in my art journals. So these aren't cards, they are pages in a mini art journal.

Here's a flip-through of the finished Sketchbook Project!

If you want to see the rest of the pages they can be found in these blog posts:

* Elbow deep in Mundanity

* A movie I can watch a billion times

* By Jove, I think I did it!

* More from the Sketchbook Project

* More still from the Sketchbook Project

* Still more from the Sketchbook Project

* Sketchbook Project Again

* It is almost done

In Joy!

Love is not limited by language.

Being an artist, I am not always in love with what I create. Sometimes I go into something with great intentions and amazing visions of what a spread might look like but find the reality of what happens on the page to be someone lacklustre and disappointing. Sometimes, it looks perfectly fine, it's a love WIP (Work In Progress); however, the energy just isn't there for whatever reason. I will sometimes find myself foolishly thinking to myself, oh I'm just not feeling it right now, Future Samm will finish it. Maybe the passion for it will hit me in the future enough to finish it off. It's never the case in my own experience. If I'm not feeling a journal spread enough to finish it in the past, I'm certainly not going to feel it enough to finish it in the future!

That was this page for me. She also has a brother page to the right there that I will be covering over and doing something that gives me joy, that I feel energy with, that arouses my creative passion. These guys just weren't doing it for me. Again, it's not that I didn't like them. They are fine. There is a lot of interest in the pages but perhaps what is lacking is any kind of meaning. Being an art therapist I think I am always seeking meaning in some way. Even if that meaning is nothing more than the enjoyment of putting mediums down on a page! So I thought I'd use this page for another Art Journal Journey page using this month's theme of LANGUAGE so kindly provided by the lovely Elle from Empire of the Cat.

So she got covered up!! I did some white gesso first but I was wanting a dark background. I've been going through a phase lately, my three last canvas' all began on black. So I brayered some black and ripped up another page from the Indian book I have cause I just love the look of that language.

One thing I really love about a dark background is putting really bright colours on top. All the better to help them pop, m'dear! I discovered these neon paints a few years ago and I absolutely adore them! They are Mont Marte fluro paints. I use them sparingly because who has copious amounts of money to spend on copious amounts of paint, amiright? Still, they have lasted me quite a while and gone a long way, which is great. I am getting close to needing to replace them. For some reason the lids are actually super weak, which is why you can see alfoil on the top of them, to stop the paints drying out cause the lids all cracked, so buyer beware.

To add more to the language theme I thought I'd use one of my word stencils on this one. I can't really make out the words in this stencil, but there are words there! I often use impasto paint for stuff like this but I thought I'd just go with plain white paint to pop off the darker background. I think it came out good.

This time, I actually thought I would do some kind of face and quote but turns out doing a face was not on the books today, Surprise!

Because I already knew the quote I was going to be writing, I ended up doing hearts with my Ceramcoat Sunset Blush. I like these paints because they are matte and they are easy to write over the top of, which I did in my trusty posca pen.

I like to mix up the lettering. Sometimes I like it all the same but still other times I like to mix it up with capitals, small letters, cursive, block letters, whatever I feel called to do. So I put down the initial lettering on the Ceramcoat but of course, you can barely see the hearts and bubbles amongst the mess of the glorious background.

So I got out my neocolor II watercolor crayons and added a bit of colour to the hearts going right over the top of the writing. I put the writing down first because 1) it gives me a guide for later, 2) it's easier to write over the Ceramcoat than it is the Neocolor and 3) when I go over it later, even if the posca is really just wiping away the Neocolor, the black ink from the first layer is still there anyway!

I thought I'd do some close-ups of the awesome layers. I love layers. Do you? How could you not? I mean being an illustrator at heart I also love completely smooth, solid, colour. I love a flat surface and crisp lines but I am also a mixed media lover and with that comes layers. Lots of textured, colourful, juicy layers! Layers you can't really see in photos on a blog. So here are some close-ups of the texture and the colours.

To finish it off, I went over the letters and defined them a bit more, I went around the outside of the bubbles and hearts with some deeper shadows, added some of my favourite Sakura gel pens to the lettering, which you can't really see here because photos never do the glittery goodness justice then the last thing I did was added some dots and shook off my while posca all over the top of it to add a bit of messy mcmess! And it is done. Another spread about Language.

In Joy!

Here is the first spread from my Art Journal Journey.

As this is another mixed media piece I decided I could also use it for the Creative Artiste Mixed Media challenge! Mediums use are: gesso, neon acrylic paint, matte acrylic paint, posca pens - black, pink and white, neocolor II watercolour crayon - black, purple and pink, Sakura gelly roll pen - pink and torn up bits of a book. I also used a stencil, while not a medium but a tool, it should be included in this list.

I've also been filling up a Sketchbook from the Sketchbook project and you can see those here:

* Elbow deep in Mundanity

* A movie I can watch a billion times

* By Jove, I think I did it!

* More from the Sketchbook Project

* More still from the Sketchbook Project

* Still more from the Sketchbook Project

* It's almost done

* B-deeba deeba, that's all folks!

You can watch a flip-through of the whole thing on my YouTube channel over HERE.

It is almost done.

 The Sketchbook is almost done, just a few more pages to show you. I'm working on the cover now and then I am going to record a flip through of the whole thing before finally sending it off overseas to be added to the physical library where they will also scan it and add it to their virtual library too, which you can find HERE. There are so many awesome Sketchbooks to browse through!

Today's post is brought to you again via my Sketchbook because I am still committed to blogging every day but I've had a bit of a rough day and a resultant mini-migraine (I've just taken pain killers and about to go to bed). So sharing the art in my Sketchbook makes for an easy post. Not sure what I'll do once I've shared all my pages, perhaps I'll just share random art I've done, we'll see.

First up:

We have this one, which was actually inspired by Effy Wild's Journal Jam recently. I followed along and this quote came from it and I loved it so much I knew I needed to add it to the Sketchbook. Of course, the page I did for the journal jam was an A4 and the Sketchbook simply isn't that big so I had to condense it down. I fished out some of my digistamps and had a colouring-in fest and I thought this girl and her dove fit the quote nicely. the digistamp is coloured with my divine Copics and glued onto one of the scrapbook pages I sewed into the Sketchbook. I put some pretty metallic washi tape down the edge. The quote is done in black posca and Sakura gelly roll pens. the background is Derwent Inktense to round it all off.

This one is another pocket, to match one closer to the start of the book. I am going to put an envelope with a coded message in it for people to de-code if they want to. I do love to add a little interaction if I can! Again this is another digistamp coloured with Copics and glued to the scrapbook paper that makes the pocket then on the page behind it I just used Derwent Inktense.

Last one for this post, this is actually the penultimate last page, next to the artist bio page. Again this is another digistamp coloured with Copic and pasted on scrapbook paper. I got a little carried away with the lettering on this one. I love the swirly curly, it's fun to do. I put this on some bright yellow paper to match her umbrella and then cut around it in a semi-fussy cut and pasted it all on the page.

Off the top of my head, I have 3 more to show you in a future post and that will be the whole book! I think it's slightly over half an inch thick and I hope they forgive me for it. I think they will. If not I guess it will get sent back to me and I will get to keep it and that's not such a bad thing because I've grown quite attached and I will definitely miss it when it's gone. Still, I do hope that it ends up in the library for people to see someday.

In Joy

Here are all my previous posts for the other pages:

* Elbow deep in Mundanity

* A movie I can watch a billion times

* By Jove, I think I did it!

* More from the Sketchbook Project

* More still from the Sketchbook Project

* Still more from the Sketchbook Project

* Sketchbook Project Again