“Hello, this is interesting; trying your hand at art? I have never seen you sketching and drawing. Now, now! what is going on?” Lulu flipped through my sketchbook as he screamed with surprise.

“Hah! I always wanted to be a good artist, and wanted my paintings to be seen in art galleries.”

“There seems to be quite a gap between the dreams and ability, my friend.” Lulu gave me a condescending look.

“You discourage me, Lulu. Did I not learn to click good photographs? I hope I will learn sketching and painting too.”

“Of course, any person can do any job to the average level. Hopefully you get better at it.”

“I am following ‘Inktober.’ I had followed it three years ago too, but gave it up mid-way.”

“What’s Inktober?”

“You do one drawing a day all through the month of October. They provide prompts. For example, the prompts for October 1, 2 and 3 were Dreams, Spiders and Path.”

“But why do you do a sketch a day? Is there any competition?”

“Nah! You draw and post it on social media. That’s all! You do not get a prize; nobody checks if you are doing it every day or have given up. The point is that if you draw regularly, you improve your skills. Inktober just provides a scheme to do it.”

“Interesting”

“There is more to it.”

“Tell me”

“For me, a prompt often become a puzzle. One prompt was ‘Fortune.’ What would you draw to depict fortune? Money? A bundle of currency notes? These are all left brainers’ ideas. Not very imaginative.”

“I do not get it”

“An artist depicts it differently. He thinks of a placing together a crystal ball and a pair of dice. You would have seen fortune tellers and their crystal ball in many comics. A pair of dice robbed the Pandavas of all their fortune.”

“You said there is more to it but I am not getting what you are trying to convey.”

“We usually do not use symbolism. Not in an imaginative way. Okay, let me put it this way. In the corporate world we are quite accustomed to convert a concept or idea in to an action plan. You wish to increase productivity, cut cost, have higher employee engagement then our left brain works overtime and produces a plan.”

“True”

“But when the prompt is ‘Dreams,’ ‘Fortune’ or ‘Massive’ we must dive deep in our mind to catch the imagery and symbols depicting it. I found it difficult to think of anything creative so no question of arranging the images creatively.”

“So?”

“Concept to action plan is easy for us. Converting a concept to imagery or symbolism is difficult. It is difficult because we have not been thinking like it. Maybe the poets do. Drawing skills is the next step, but using the right brain to decide what to draw is so difficult.”

“I get you.”

“I always thought that I was a creative person. That image is now shattered. Sketching and drawing taught me one more thing ….”

“This must be interesting, tell me …”

“I tend to work with speed while sketching. That is where things go wrong.”

“What then is the right thing to do?”

“Work slowly. Corporate world teaches you that speed is the essence. Art teaches you that careful detailing is the essence of good work. It takes tremendous patience and time to create a good piece of art, and I am not talking of how long Michaelangelo took to complete his great sculptures and paintings.

“I know he took four years to complete Sistine chapel painting”

“I discovered that what spoiled my sketches was not proportions but the haste to complete the picture.”

“Okay, okay, so much about the art. What have you discovered finally?”

“Creating art helped me understand myself a shade better. My creation reflected my haste, my impatience, my inadequacies of conceptualizing. I realized that I am miles away from creating good art.”

“Ha, ha! You do not have to be so pessimistic. Art tells you where you stand against your own standards. It helps you reflect, and introspections are so therapeutic! Rachel Naomi Remen says ‘At the deepest level, the creative process and the healing process arise from a single source.’

“That’s insightful”

“You can use art in your coaching practice”

“Oh, no! I am afraid that my ‘coachee’ may be better at the art!” Lulu chuckled and resumed flipping through my sketchbook.

Vivek S Patwardhan

“What you leave behind is not what is engraved in stone monuments, but what is woven into the lives of others.” / All work copyrighted.