To be empty is also to be present without an expectation. If you already have a planned outcome, there is no place for an occurrence outside of your known territory. 

The recognition of that which calls us the most comes with being open and letting through. In the painting process, we practice unconditional regard for what speaks to us at the moment.

Pure impulse without rationale is considered dangerous by popular beliefs, but intuition is an intelligent language of the source. In the painting process we explore the alchemical power of spontaneous expression without concern for consequences!

Interpretation is often the enemy of insight. We have strong preconceived ideas about what each image means, which is never the full story. The need to interpret truncates the subtle, more authentic process of receiving. Yet an insight that arises gradually as you engage the process is uniquely relevant to you.

What would you never paint?
We tend to have a definite description of ourselves that confines our potential for breakthrough.
The painting experience can expand those boundaries where our wholeness is permissible without bias.

Where is the meaning in a painting that seems to be meaningless? Or perhaps the more essential question would be, why is this dynamic primordial visual stream available to the human psyche at all? There is no one answer, but it could be that by honouring this language, we get closest to our true nature.

The blank space is never empty.
What is it asking of you?
Is there anything coming through that nothingness?
Listen with radical honesty.

Colour is a conversation starter, beware of mistaking it as arbitrary. The deepest intelligence announces itself through colour. Are you familiar with the feeling of craving a colour?

Notice if there is a part of you that really wants to create a ‘beautiful’ or a ‘meaningful’ painting. The need to look pleasant often interferes with where the energy actually wants to go. By cancelling the noise that desire creates, we give way to a more natural unfolding.

We allow an essential innocence and a flow when we let the obvious happen in the painting process. What brings you a sense of wonder is not ordinary, even if it seems repetitive and mundane on the surface.

We tend to reject most of what comes to us in the immediate moment. Our filters are powerful and will not allow a raw expression without direction. One of the real challenges of this practice is to have unconditional regard for what wants to be painted. In doing so, we give full form to what breaks the confines of our judgement.

The brush responds to energy, not to your idea of how something needs to look. The reason we don’t worry about having the skill is because the hand and the brush creates its own version of your imagination. Our job is to trust the energy and the image-maker within.

Are you willing to respect every stroke exactly for what it is knowing that it is sacred? In honouring the voice that speaks to us, we allow a greater guidance to come through.

Being completely stuck in the painting process is a rich time. Pausing and hanging out with what’s already there with a quality of honesty reveals deeper currents. We allow ourselves to fully not know until something lands and the brush wants to do it.

What is really happening when you begin to question the point of it all? The minds demands rationale. On the contrary, if you listen to your essential aliveness, it will bring you back to the simplicity of what the brush wants to do rather than what it should. Pay attention to what brings you alive.