Friday, January 29, 2010

Channeling From Seth About Drawing

No matter how hard you work in order to achieve the path of advancement one might adopt a practice of evaluation periodically. In this way you might be able to set both long and short term goals for whatever it is that you endeavor to do.

The goals that you make might be based upon the thing you wish to accomplish. These steps are necessary to be able to see that progress is being made. Much as a child receives report cards during the course of the time they spend in school, so too could you apply the practice of self evaluation to ensure that you are making some sort of project with your own projects.

For instance, if you have always wanted to draw but have never tried because you feel you have no talent, the first thing you might do is to say phooey to talent and proceed with your dream. Understand that drawing employs a way of seeing most do not ordinarily practice. In the struggle to learn to write a person is, at first, halting in their progress, but their teachers demand of them time spent and much practice until the words, the vocabulary becomes available to them and the act of writing no longer stands between thought and paper. It moves smoothly. Our channel who enjoys writing says to people who profess an inability to write, “You can tell me a story can’t you? Well, you can write.”

So, a beginning practice to learn how to draw would be to look at things differently. Yes, you see an apple before you. Now, look at the area outside of the skin of the apple. Look at the edge of the apple before you and the space next to it. Imagine this border is a line. See how it curves. Focus on the apple. Begin to note in your mind all the different things about the apple. The way the colors change. The way the light strikes upon the skin. See how the stem extends from the top. Notice how the skin is different at that point from the skin that stretches around the middle of the apple.

Now, take a bite out of the apple. Study it again. Look at how the flesh of the apple is different from the outside. Look at your own bite mark and see how different the cut is from the cut made by a knife. Now, have a look at the shadow behind the apple. That is also a part of what would be a picture of the apple.

Finally, pick up a pencil. With your eyes on the apple slowly move around and over the apple with your eyes. As your eyes move so does your pencil upon the paper. Think in terms of lines and not of apple. Follow the lines without looking at your paper. Keep your eyes trained upon the apple and your pencil in constant contact with the paper. Do not lift your pencil at any time. Do this slowly. Do this with deliberation. At the end of this exercise look at your paper and see how you did. Your starting line likely will not meet up with your ending line, but you should have a somewhat distorted picture of an apple.

Do this exercise over and over again with other objects. Draw your hand. Draw simple objects. As your drawing muscles get exercised your hand and your eye will begin to move together. Crumple up a piece of paper and draw the complicated folds of the paper.

An interesting effect of this new skill you are developing is that you are also using parts of your brain not normally used. Learning how to draw will enable you to access your creativity more easily. It is also a most welcome introduction to being able to focus more completely and to learn how to meditate.

This is a very basic lesson in how to draw. Be open to other teachers who will certainly come your way; books from the library, shows on television or, perhaps a class you can take.

Keep a record of your dated drawings and periodically look at them. With a few hours spent on the project every week your progress is assured and looking at your simple drawings will do much to boost your confidence in this new skill of drawing.