It’s been a very volatile few days. My boyfriend’s papa passed away last Saturday after months of suffering from a brain tumour. For the few years I’ve known him, he was like a father to me. The father I never really had as my birth father was more or less absent much of my life. As such, his passing affected me quite a lot. Grieving takes so much energy from you. On top of that, it’s also the energy to support others, as in my case my boyfriend and rest of family. I can imagine how devastating it must be all, as he was a wonderful dad and grandad.
When you’re so exhausted emotionally and physically, you start to lose concentration and can’t focus properly. It was also so many “insignificant things” that blew out of proportion because I was so overwhelmed with having to deal with grief and getting on with normal life.. Getting upset and irritated by everything: misplacing things, forgetting things, dropping things. And then crying, screaming and basically being a helpless child who can’t control her emotions. Then I was told it might help to draw about how I feel.
To be honest, I was not in the right mood to draw. It’s because I like to draw about happy things. But today was different. So I decided to be brave and pick up some paper and start. Even just scribble. Out came the charcoal stick and I began doodling away all free style. Just whatever came to mind. Once I was done, I looked at it and thought. Hmm, how about some colour? Maybe it’ll cheer me up a bit. And you know what it’s like with art. Once you start, you continue till you’re satisfied!
So I grabbed some soft pastels (Faber Castell) and just lightly filled in the bits. Nothing elaborate. Just scribble it all in. I went for a light touch this time. At this point, I was not striving for perfection as I just wanted to find a means to calm my nerves. Sure enough, it worked! And here I’d like to share. Not exactly my best work but it still made me feel better.
I realise now that it always helps to let out your emotions in a creative way, be it writing or drawing or playing music. Grief is more powerful than you think. It leads to other negative emotions and thoughts which needs to be exhausted. Being overwhelmed also leads to anger and frustration which I certainly felt. I now discover that much of the frustration stemmed from not being able to relax and do some artwork because there was too much going on. Whilst I kept telling myself, “I don’t have time to paint because I can’t find the time to” or even “I’m not in the mood and not with it today”, I made myself set aside some time to sit down, take a deep breath and start drawing. It need not be perfect or even complete. I am glad I took the plunge. And now I can see things in better perspective and feel more in control of myself.
My Kawaii Quarter 