Flow State.

While walking upstairs, last night, my wife called me to the window. It was storming outside, which is always beautiful but this wasn’t quite a lightning storm. It seemed more like an electrical storm in the clouds. There was no audible thunder, just quick flashes of light, percolating in the sky. 

I find inspiration everywhere. Any moment an idea or an image hits me, I try to grab on to it. I have made it my practice to capture these thoughts. My phone storage lugs around thousands of pictures of quickly captured landscape shots and textured surfaces - future paintings or photoshop layers. That’s without mentioning the abundance of screenshots I’ve snatched for reference, for some future illustration or just an idea for a project. 

My Google Docs yearn for some sort of organization. New documents pile on top of the last ones, burying the words that haven’t been opened recently. I keep these notes and lists and thoughts for artwork, all stories in the process of being told, in my cloud. I want to be able to access them all. I need to add and edit and refine, when I am waiting for a given five minutes. I never know which thought is developing, until its growth hits me.

Maybe I prefer to live, juggling multiple creative endeavors at once. I have accepted that I will never be fully finished with every project that I conceive. All the while, I am trying to transform these fragments of ideas into completed works as life allows. This is why I work across mediums and styles. My best work is always different than what I have already created.

Perhaps I have simply fuelled my creative fire long enough that it has just become a compulsion. These systems are evidence that I have built my life to facilitate artistic outlets. To boil it all down though, takes an examination across all of the open tabs in my mind. Some days I need to paint and in doing so a painting emerges. Other days, I have to draw but specifically with my Lamy Safari Fountain Pen because it is the only tool that will articulate that vision onto the paper. I get frustrated with Photoshop, only because they keep “updating” it, but otherwise I know that a given project will only be made complete through Adobe.

The common denominator that I reach, across all of these mediums and practices is my obsession for flow state. I am beyond blessed to be able to pivot between projects and disciplines. When inspiration for artwork matures, somewhere in the back of my mind, I arrive at its method of expression. I have learned not to force a design or a painting. Coerised work always betrays its maker. My practice of capturing ideas allows for them to develop on their own, so that when they are ripe, they pour out of me. 

What I seek is the totally engulfing experience of creation. Flow state is when all of my focus is on the next line or the next brush stroke. This focus tunes my brain. It allows mental cramps and tangled synapses to unwind. At some point, I inevitably look at my watch and discover that several hours have passed. I stand back to look at my work and realize, I have tangibly captured uncountable moments of myself in the form of physical artwork. The materialization of flow state is an addicting reward. There is resolution to one of those brief moments or ideas that I had jotted down. A reference has been utilized to its full potential. A three word note can be deleted. 

Don’t Follow Me.

There is enough evil in this world, we need not add to it. I remember, in my twenties, holding a firm belief that I should strive to be part of something bigger than myself. I sought to do good and to serve others. I suppose that I thought I could work my way into an organization and earn an indelible legacy. Now I am fighting to detangle my life from the harm that lie caused me.

The organization chart was a pyramid with one man on top. At the broad bottom, there were hundreds of us. Most of us seemed to believe the same thing but there were broken worker bees as well. I remember seeing those who had become casualties of the system. We all thought that they were burnt out and just needed to retire. God, what hell they must have been in. But nevertheless I put sweat equity into that career. I preached personal sacrifice to those who came behind me. And I preached personal sacrifice to my family, who was awarded the remnants that were left of me. As I slowly ascended the workplace hierarchy I became indoctrinated; I was leading by example. If you asked me, I’d say that was living the dream, making a difference. I felt like I was neck and neck with the Jones’. And I fucking loved it. I was part of the system. 

And then, just like the cliche, everything came crashing down. Tragically, this was my literal experience as 400 lbs of steel equipment fell on top of me due to a poor design and mechanical failure. And just like that, I was broken. My helmet saved my life but did not shield me from severe deficits. It was my strength that failed me though. I believed that I could stand back up and recover. I wanted to cowboy-up and preserve my reputation. I had to return to my spot in that place that was bigger than me. I needed to get back to the hierarchy. With an under treated traumatic brain injury, my family and I were left to navigate the system without assistance. In workers comp, you are faking it until you can prove otherwise and I was broken in a broken system. 

Head injury specialists were requested repeatedly but the gatekeepers were fierce. My employer was legally off the hook long before I regained any bearings. Instead of being supported, I was ushered out the door and under the rug even after I appealed the process up my chain of command. I had given my youth and my strength to be part of a system that quickly cast me aside. As a faithful soldier, a man of the company, I had surrendered my freedom to work mandatory overtime, receive schedule and assignment changes outside of my control. Regard to a member's life, their plans and their families were never factored in. Obediently I gave them myself, over and over. It wasn’t until I found my place in the purgatory of workers comp that I felt truly powerless and at the mercy of a system that took no responsibility for dismantling the life that I had chosen. The organization that I had believed was a vehicle for good, felt no obligation to do what was right.

Remaining angry would have been easy. I never received an apology for cost that my family and I had to bear. But the gift that I was given was the knowledge that the organization that I served, the thing that was bigger than myself, was and will remain more broken than me. Healing required the death of my dream and the loss of a pathway. Had my injury never occurred, perhaps this system would have harmed me more over the natural progression of my years in its service. I have come to terms with the evil that organizations become. They are beyond the capacity of humanity.

Now two and a half years later, I am recovering my body and my mind but I am still trying to understand life apart from system. The good that I had tried to be, as a cog in the machine, is not gone but my pathway is murky now. Holding myself to my own high standards, I am striving to figure things out as an independent artist. I have no idea where I am going on this new journey but I know that it will be without organizational flow charts. I do not want to depend upon established platforms, such as social media, for success. Such algorithms are without soul. Instead, I will be building my next steps myself. My goals don’t include going viral or becoming a brand. I want to have growth as an artist, regardless of number of followers or subscribers. Art cannot be separated from humanity. I have to do my best work for me. I hope that the things that I create speak to you but to be clear, they are for me. If you believe that this is a terrible business model, please don’t follow me.

Time.

Time is all that we have. Our moments matter because they are the only thing that we truly keep. Our memories are our existence and our days are limited. I wear my wristwatch constantly as a ticking reminder of the great equalizer. I love a good field watch because they are made to take a beating. This one here is made out of titanium with a sapphire crystal. As far as I am aware, those are the toughest materials for a proper wristwatch. It endures every day life and adventures alike. For me, that means it can traverse the jungle and withstand bush hogging in the heat of summer.

They say that you can tell a lot about a person by the watch that they wear. And I agree but refuse to play along entirely. Time pieces have an interesting history. Before digital technology and batteries, way before the apple watch, extreme craftsmanship was required to create mechanical precision, ticking along on our wrists. Like any craft, watchmakers made complicated pieces individually and by hand. Nothing was made to be disposable but rather to become heirlooms in due time. Perhaps this tradition of quality, made watches a tool and also a luxury. In my lifetime, brands like Rolex, Omega, and Patek Phillipe, while making incredible pieces, are namely status symbols. To me, high-end watches are the more compact equivalent of a Ferarri or Tesla; their emblems are little flags to tell others what you are about and what you have accomplished. Now this is where I prefer to deviate.

I love that my field watch has a sterile dial. My time piece is not boasting my financial status but rather quietly, ruggedly prepared for what I can do. I have worn watches up and down mountains and into burning buildings but that is nothing compared to the battles that similar wristwatches have faced. This unmarked field watch is in the tradition of U.S. Military’s A-11 watch. Through World War II, the Korean and the Vietnam wars, soldiers were issued similar field watches made to technical standards by a variety of manufacturers. These were tough tools, created not for individual expression or status but for perseverance toward larger purposes. Not to say that governmental standards are a high bar, but detracting from name-brand recognition and focusing on resilience and capability do align with my values.

Most importantly, my watch is an automatic. That means that my movements wind its mainspring. The tiny engine inside this titanium case is called a movement, which fits because my life and my actions allow it to keep time. If I don’t wear it, in a day or two, it will stop. The sweeping second hand betrays the harsh ticking of a quartz watch but an ear to the crystal will still let its speedy heartrate be heard. An automatic watch is a reminder that we are entwined with time. Our hearts beat together. Every decision that we make is measured in minutes and seconds. Time is life and our time matters.

My goal is not to be obsessed with watches but rather communicate the urgency that I live with. Again, time is life and time is precious. This doesn’t mean that every moment needs to be stimulation or forward progress but rather intention. I need to deliberately stop some moments to hear others, experience a setting or connect with those that I love. When those pauses end, I need to use my hands and my heart to create things that I care about. I need to build my life with focus. Time should be used to build beauty, art, growth, and memories alike. Stop scrolling and live your moments.