Anisette Studio

Good morning! This is made with Black India Ink Micron Pen, pastel pencil and a blender pencil. The color is a little different. Title: A Floral Suprise.

Today’s Joyce Hifler: “A time to seek, and a time to lose_____.” You have not dreamed until you’ve dreamed_____ a childhood dream, you see____ You haven’t thought a happy thought_____ or know just how to be____ a king or queen or circus clown____ or forest ranger brave____ You haven’t lived a real life____ until you’ve dug a cave____ and you have to climb the old ash tree____ and spin a cowboy rope____ but more than all these things____ you must know how to hope____ and believe with all your childhood heart____ and never once confuse____ a grown-up fear with a childhood dream____ for childhood dreams can’t lose!”

I know as a child I had hope, dreams that seemed possible. Later, life became much more confused. We know what we know according to the age and stage we are at. How to hang on to dreams and have hope, now means to live in the present, not in the past, and not for the future. I had to think about what that last bit meant. Because the past is the past that was easier to see. But do we not need to plan for our futures? Yes, but no so entrenched in doing so that life is all about the future! We can’t be present if we live that way. We miss out on what is happening in the present. Living in the present is what brings us into the future.

In my past I did not believe or understand how I could control my own life. And I wondered why this was so. Is it because as children we learn our parent’s control what we do. Children resist that control naturally. I did but As I moved into motherhood, I realized that it was up to me to support and guide my children about how to be in control of their lives as adults. The response is “How the hell do I do that?” LOL But if you figure out those pearls of wisdom, you drop them, and your children will work those things out. I wanted my children to think for themselves so I would ask them, “If you were me, what would you do?” Much to my mother-amusement I what the kids came up was much more severe than I would do. I would find myself saying, “Well, I think this part of what you would do would work well. The other thoughts don’t seem fair. So, that will be your punishment. It would be something like not doing something they wanted to do. I also wanted them to think about what they had done. I would have them write about what they should not do, especially why they should not do it. This gave me time to get my own balance as well as writing was a way to have them think about what they had done. One example is when my middle daughter pushed her younger brother on the cellar stairs. Her response made me laugh even if such a think might happen. “I might kill my brother!” “I could make him break his arm!” “He won’t play with me!

I recall trying to dig to China. I am not sure who initiated that idea of China. I suspect it was an adult idea. The hole my brother and I dug did get fairly deep, and then our parents would change the subject. I don’t think they thought we would stay with it so long, with such serious intent. Later you realize the idea was very silly and impossible. That is where you feel your parents are not being nice to have you put all that effort in. But it had been fun!

What you think is possible as a child is very different when you’re older. Experience teaches us what works, and what doesn’t. Its self-talk that prevents us from doing. We need to be careful about what we come to believe. This is why sayings can help. “Where there is a will, there is a way!” “Try, try again!” “There is always tomorrow!” Such one liner(s) are a starting point for me. I use them to remind me I can find a way forward, “If I don’t try, nothing happens!”

Best wishes! Pejj