About Liana

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Brisbane, Australia
My studio is located in Brisbane, Australia. For the past 10 years I’ve been enjoying creating jewellery designs from an array of mundane materials. Tupperware and knitting needles have remained a firm favourite. My designs have been published numerous times, graced the shelves of many wonderful galleries and stores and been worn by those whose aren’t afraid of colour and attention. All of which I am very grateful for. For several years I’ve also been fortunate enough to work with many businesses as a coach and workshop facilitator.

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Wednesday, November 07, 2007

Fear & Other Great Stuff


The lovely & very thoughtful Denise/Jejune posted this blog link, all about the tips, slips, stumbles, and leaps on the creative journey, in one of my earlier comment sections. She thought I may have been interested in it. She was right. I clicked on it this morning and had a good read. I thought there was so much excellent advice here that I wanted to share it also.

Fear Factor -I particularly loved this one because it was the topic of conversation with my friend yesterday, and has just sort of been on my mind lately. Once you take fear out of the decision making process you always make a better choice. As said in the post, Fear undermines us. It justifies bad behavior. It is the road to the collapse of self-respect. I can’t live my life without fear, but there are a million great reasons to make decisions and always one lousy one–I did it because I was scared. I'll also add that to not do something that you feel is right, or worthwhile, because you are afraid, is a poor decision (safe is a different matter). You just miss out that way.

In regards to fear, I am talking about my professional/creative life - underpricing, saying 'yes' all the time, etc. But this does cross over into my personal life as well. What I do is so much a part of who I am that I can't always distinguish the two. Then again, maybe I don't have to.

There is also a great quote on the blog by sufi poet and fool,Mullah Nasiruddin, who said, “Good judgment comes from experience. Experience comes from bad judgment.” Indeed!

2 comments:

Denise said...

Oh I'm so glad you are finding Quinn's articles helpful - I always find something to think about in them too! Quinn is a friend of a friend... and one insightful lady.

I know what you mean about fear. in my 10 years of being self-employed I've pushed myself through seemingly endless fear barriers, but sometimes it all gets the better of me! Sounds like we have some similar creative 'traps'...

Margaux Lange said...

Excellent! Thanks for the link. This is a big one for me, fear is my biggest obstacle as I'm sure it is for many artists.

I personally love these two books on the subject…

Art and Fear by David Bayles and Ted Orland:
http://www.amazon.com/Art-Fear-David-Bayles/dp/0961454733

Feel the Fear and Do It Anway by Susan Jeffers:
http://www.amazon.com/Feel-Fear-Do-Anyway/dp/0345487427/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1/104-7619009-8595117?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1194639612&sr=1-1