I sometimes wonder why I am doing this

Jewelry Discussion
21

Wade,

From today’s posts you have already figured out you’re not alone –
feeling like a failure is part of any creative field, and most of
the ones that aren’t creative.

One thing no one mentioned, though, is the importance of what in the
religious world is called “Sabbath time” – the idea that we need
time for rest and renewal, something our 24/7 world tends to offer
very little of. If you find yourself plugging along, overwhelmed and
exhausted, with no creative energy – you need to take time off.

For some people, that means vacation, but not always. I love
vacations, and take a lot of them with my family. But a family
vacation is usually busy – at least as busy as my “normal” life –
and oftentimes exhausting. (Oh, how many times have I come back and
said, “I need a vacation after that vacation!” ) So I also schedule a
retreat every year, just me. In my case, I go to a local monastery
and spend two days praying, reading, and eating the monks’ excellent
cooking. Because retreats are typically silent, I don’t have to talk
to anyone. There is a rhythm and a peace to it that allows me to
genuinely rest and return energized and excited by the work I have to
do.

There are all kinds of retreats. There are religious retreats,
artistic retreats, individual retreats and group retreats. It might
be a trip to sit on the beach and watch the waves, or a climb up a
mountain to watch the sun rise. It depends on what renews your
spirit, but whatever it is, it should not resemble what you do day-
in, day-out. If you’ve been caught up in the day-to-day struggle for
awhile, you may well just need time to rest, to NOT feel the
pressure of creating, to remember why this career spoke to your
spirit in the first place. Time for rest is absolutely essential for
the creative process, and it’s usually the first thing we small
business owners sacrifice. If you are regularly feeling like chucking
everything that once brought you joy, you’ve probably been starving
your spirit, or trying to feed it with crumbs.

Oh, and don’t wait until you “have time” for a retreat. You will
never have time. I don’t know anyone who has time to take care of
themselves spiritually. For me, I have two children, a husband, a
successful career as a freelance writer, and am in the midst of an
intensive preparation process that I hope will eventually lead to
ordination as an Episcopal priest. If I wait until it’s convenient,
my only rest will be in heaven! So I just pick a weekend and go. (As
a jeweler, it might be best not to choose, say, the first weekend in
December, of course. :slight_smile: Attending to your spiritual needs will not
only help ease you out of the dumps, it will actually help you
become more productive, and maybe even see how to turn some of those
failures into successes.

Peace be upon you!

Suzanne

Suzanne Wade
Writer/Editor
@Suzanne_Wade1
(508) 339-7366
Fax: (928) 563-8255
www.rswade.net

22

I’ve been through the same thing recently. I came up with a concept
for a series of pendants that I thought would be great. After I
finished them I realized that the forms I had hammered out of metals
(copper,bronze, and silver) were pleasing, but the patinae and
ornamentation were not. So I wire-brushed everything off and tossed
them back in the pickle pot. Some have made multiple trips back
through the pickle pot. Now I’m getting a series of pieces that I
like. My wife keeps reminding me of something she read about Thomas
Edison and his method of inventing. He said he just kept trying
things until he ran out of ideas that didn’t work.

Brian Corll
Brian Corll, Inc.
1002 East Simpson Street
Mechanicsburg, PA 17055

23

Jewelry is a demanding mistress.

My father wanted me to go into making dental stuff. His rational was
that I would still be working at lost-wax casting and with the same
skills, yet I would have a more secure and prosperous life. I could
not imagine a hell that would be more torturous to my spirit.

Take heart we have all shared in your despair. This too shall pass.
No time spent in pursuit of of your passion is wasted.

Nanz Aalund
Associate Editor / Art Jewelry magazine
21027 Crossroads Circle / Waukesha WI 53187-1612
262.796.8776 ext.228

24

hey think of all the times the risky things and new and exciting
ideas have worked…

nothing is ever wasted, you’ve just learnt something new, that’s all

  • just because it didn’t work out as you were planning and hoping,
    maybe something from it will spark a new idea that grows, you never
    know where " disasters "will lead, and meanwhile, enjoy the red!
    remember, this is the best occupation,

cheers, Christine in sth Australia

25

I am so glad that the Orchid community, for whom I have the greatest
admiration and respect, also have members who learn through
frustration and error. Mistakes are such an opportunity to learn. As
a total amateur with only a two week basic course under my belt some
five years ago, lots of ideas and capabilities and the patient
guidance of a couple of really special jeweller friends, I constantly
stuff up! Without exception, every single time I can think of I learn
things and often develop new ideas and directions as a result of this
learning. That doesn’t mean I don’t get cross with myself or that I
don’t come close to tears at times with frustration!! However, when I
read threads like this from serious, experienced jewellers, I feel
almost worthy of following my passion for making!!!

:slight_smile: Kimmyg

26

I’d like to add to Suzanne’s post regarding how cathartic taking
some time to clear out the cobwebs can be. While I don’t have to
depend on my daily stonesmithing habit to support myself or family, I
can certainly relate to frustration and failure when a thing just
isn’t going right. Many times I’ve thrown things & stomped away from
whatever project just refused to cooperate, swearing never EVER to
return to my shop.15 minutes later I’m right back in there.

I was at a creative burnout point last year about the time Katrina
hit us here in New Orleans. Following that day all we did was
struggle & deal with life, so no time and nowhere to play with rocks
or jewels. For 6+ months I was forced to set aside the one thing that
I love doing most. When the day arrived that our garage renovation
was finished into a shiny new workshop, I went back to my Genie with
a fresh new perspective and hit the ground running like an Irish
setter. It was then when I realized just how beneficial that time off
had been.

Maybe simply just knowing from all of these posts so far that you’re
in good company and everybody here can totally empathsize with how
you’re feeling right now is helpful in some small way. I hope so.

Hang in there :slight_smile: Carol

27

Hello,

I am going through a personal “why am I doing this” moment and I
found the answers to this posting quite supportive and useful.

That being said, there’s a short and wonderful book, Art and Fear,
that will help bring you to a place of creative strength
again…almost guaranteed.

Here are a few get-you-going quotations that I post in classrooms
when I teach. Hope you find them effective.

So you see, imagination needs moodling, long, inefficient happy
idling, dawdling and puttering… Brenda Ueland

The work of craft is a fine example of the work of our life; our
universal obligation… Carla Needleman

“Do, or do not. There is no ‘try’.”…Yoda Note: This is my personal
favorite.

Results! Why, man, I have gotten a lot of results. I know several
thousand things that don’t work… Thomas Edison

I find out what I really want by seeing what I do…anon

Making art is “that tiny click near the heart that meant; it was not
bad.” Lenore Tawney

You learn how to make your work by making your work. “Art and Fear”

Art is like beginning a sentence before you know its ending. “Art
and Fear”

The seed of your next art work lies embedded in the imperfections of
your current piece. “Art and Fear”

"It’s OK if I don’t think like everyone else! Go, Brain, Go!,"
Qualcomm commercial

“Creativity is… allowing yourself to make mistakes. Art is… …
knowing which ones to keep.” The Wire Artist

One must still have chaos in oneself to be able to give birth to a
dancing star. Nietsche

We learn backwards. We live forwards. adapted from Kierkegaard

Some days you’re the pigeon and some days you’re the statue…anon

Not one shred of evidence supports the notion that life is
serious…(oh well)

“Even if you’re on the right track, you’ll get run over if you just
sit there.” Will Rogers

“Go out on a limb…that’s where the fruit is”. Will Rogers

“Be not lax in celebrating; Be ablaze with ENTHUSIASM” Hildegard of
Bingen

Drift, Explore adjacencies., Begin anywhere BRUCE MAU

Make mistakes faster…capture accidents…Bruce Mau

Rule of Thumb from Wendell Castle “If you hit the bulls eye every
time, the target is too close.”

You will do foolish things. But do them with enthusiasm. Colette

Fear is the darkroom where negatives are developed. anon

Haji ma moshte (Japanese…“and now it begins”)
Linda Kaye-Moses

28

It’s tough. I ask myself questions like that as well because I’ve
been out of art school for almost 3 years now and only recently have
been able to get back onto my feet and into my metal work. I was
beginning to think my 4 years and my BFA were going to be wasted.

After graduation I had no studio, no money/job and bills were poring
in which left me stranded. I had to get a crappy state administrative
job which I’ve been temping at for a year now and still haven’t been
hired or offered health insurance (sorry have to complain about
that). So ask yourself…would you really be happy being a plumber or
a chiropractor or a car salesman? Half the people hate their jobs
anyway but those of us who have a “gift, skill, talent” are the lucky
ones and should stick with what we got!

I may have to slave away at a crummy job for 40hrs a week for the
time being but at least I have my creativity/passion/art/metal to go
back to and keep me motivated and maybe someday I’ll get to the point
were I can say “so-long” to my cubicle life!!

HANG IN THERE…and thanks for posting…you’re not alone!

29 
One thing no one mentioned, though, is the importance of what in
the religious world is called "Sabbath time"

Thanks for this point, Suzanne. I think it is very important, and
very hard to do in our world. It made me think about the ways I cope
with the need for renewal in my own life, and one of my favorite
ways is to take a workshop out of town. I find the total immersion
away from home very refreshing, and I can “justify” it because I’m
learning something.

Thinking of this made me want to mention Wild Acres. It is a retreat
center in North Carolina that hosts a variety of group retreats with
classes, and some of those are arranged by various minerology
groups. I went there a few years ago for a week (during hurricane
Ivan!) through the Southeast Minerological Federation. I joined a
local federation (not local here- I’m in Chicago-- I just picked one
in Kentucky) for $9 a year, and then the week at Wild Acres cost
under $300, including room and board!!! I took faceting, but they
had a variety of classes including “gem appreciation” (which is
actually beginning minerology/gemology), stained glass, opal
cutting, etc. I really loved it-- like summer camp for adults. They
ring a bell to wake you up and to come to meals. It is beautiful
there, and everyone is friendly and laid back. Meals were basic
American, but very tasty and reasonably wholesome, served family
style, and you sit with anyone you want and get to know everybody. I
hope to go back soon.

Noel

30

I just have to respond to this. I, like so many have voiced here,
also wonder why at times. After I was disabled in an accident, lost
my 50k a year with great benefits job over it, then not long after my
4th spinal surgery having my wife divorced me over it( her reason was
because I had become bad for her social life… no kidding, that was
the only reason she has ever given me) For quite a while, I really
wondered why I bother to stay alive. Its really a good thing I don’t
drink or do drugs, as I could easily see how someone who did, could
spiral completely out of control.

I made it through due to my love for my daughters who were 18 months
and 3 years old then.

The past few years have been full of hills and valleys of depression
and just surviving. You have no idea how it is. I’ve pretty much
worked for the last 28 years, and now, I was useless. There’s
something that will burst your bubble too. No one wants to hire a
gimp. But due my kids, and that I really wanted to be a good role
model for my daughters, my passion for jewelry, and my determination
that I will not live having to depend on government disability checks
the rest of my life if I could do it. I was determined to turn my
hobby, into a career. And one side benefit I could see from pursuing
a career over the fact that I love it and have been dabbling in it as
a hobby for a long time, was that even in America where being
disabled is like having a death sentence in the working world due to
fear of what it will do to health benefit cost, stupid thoughts of it
being an extra liability with Workers Comp, and the fact no one
really wants to be around someone with a disability, visible or not,
many people just don’t like it. But if I could master jewelry enough
to make sellable jewelry, I could be self employed.

I can tell you from experience, it really does damage ones ego when
your daughters kindergarten teacher has each child do a presentation
called " What my parents do at work", and my daughter gets to tell
her whole class that her Daddy does nothing all day! At that age,
they
don’t full grasp the concept of spinal and nerve damage and living in
extreme agonizing pain 24/7 for the rest of my life. ( thank god for
pain medication!) So as far as they understand, Daddy just lays
around doing nothing all day. Anyway, that gets one thinking of
having to live like that day after day after day, and expecting to
have to endure hearing that said in front of a class probably at
least until both my daughters get past the 5th grade of so. Yup, its
days like that can make you want to play in traffic. But, once I
regroup my thoughts, I find myself 10x more motivated to succeed in
the jewelry trade.

In the last 4 years, I’ve broken, melted, smashed, and totally
destroyed more projects at my bench trying to teach myself to make
jewelry than I ever thought possible. Its aggravating, discouraging
and depressing, that is for sure. Then, I finally found a way to go
to Paris Texas Jewelry college, and I was on cloud nine. But, as soon
as the deal was finalized, and I informed my now X wife that I was
going, she instantly threatened to take me to court to try to get
full custody of our daughters and swore if she could, I would never
see them again. So much for Paris Texas. And depression fully sunk
back in. I was going to give up my dream of jewelry as a career for
good, and those thoughts of kissing a bus ran through my mind again.
But, so did the thoughts of my daughters, and I couldn’t do that to
them. So, it was back to the books, the tapes, my GIA GG course work
and wonderful people on forums like Orchid and Gemology online.
ESPECIALLY the people here on Orchid. There have been a few who have
been more than helpful. Jewelry wise and emotional wise. Noel is one,
and of course, the fantastic Wayne Emery, who, without his
intervention, I wouldn’t be working as an apprentice for most
possibly one of the best employers in the history of employers! No
lie, in all my years and all my employers, I have never worked for,
nor heard of anyone who has worked for anyone as cool as this Joel.
And the people who I work with are great too. Everyone is overly
helpful and , well, its just more than I could have dreamed of.
Believe me, I’m not saying to rub Joel’s ego, he doesn’t need it. I
don’t know how I got so lucky. Be it luck, be it God, be it whatever,
I just hope I can prove myself and I get hired on as a regular
employee someday. Yes, there have been some days I destroyed things.
I actually over enthusiastically jumped into the task of cleaning up
some parts after casting, and removed a little to much material on a
very important part of a custom necklace, which needed to be done on
time, with a selling price of around 60 thousand dollar. No, it
wasn’t a happy moment in my new apprenticeship or at the shop. But I
was completely knocked back by the reaction of Joel. Upset, yes, but
nothing I would have expected, and he didn’t take me off the project
either…jbennettjewelry.com. This has to be the greatest, most
encouraging, and defanantly the most understanding and supportive
place Ive ever worked. I pray I can stay here.

I am positive I will have many more days in my life, be they work,
family, health, inner self, or public related emotional bummers, but
hey, that is life. Literally! Everyone has them, and some of them
take longer to get over than others. Some, we may never get over. We
just learn to live with them, and keep on going. I don’t think there
are really any failures in our lives, just obstacles. Some really
seem to suck though don’t they! One thing I find myself saying to
myself when an obstacle happens to me is a phrases from my 4 year old
daughters favorite movie, Finding Nemo…

“Just keep swimming, swimming swimming. Just keep swimming”

31

GO DANIEL! Believe in the laws of attraction - whatever you
want/need, just think it and you will have
it…eventually…don’t lose focus! You are an inspiration!

:slight_smile: kimmyg

32

I cried because I had no shoes until I met a man who had no
feet…

http://www.donivanandmaggiora.com

33

Daniel

You are a true inspiration to those of us who forget what it really
means to work for what one has, and I am sure to 2 very lucky
daughters. Well done and all the best…

Raakhi