Fragment of a non-standard self-talk

Leia 1: “So, what is it that you do?”

Leia 2: “What do you mean?...Like, right now?!”

Leia 1: “No, silly :) I know what you’re doing right now – you’re talking to yourself again. Talking and not really listening, I might add.”

Leia 2: “What I do…I draw. First, I draw and then, I'll paint. After I paint, I will scan what I drew and painted and have fun with all the possibilities offered by digital manipulation. The more I learn about it and lean into it, the more I enjoy the creative freedoom I discover! 

Leia 1: “This is all very exciting, but I was hoping to hear from you what it is you are LOOKING for through all these steps. Steps which took you long enough to take, since you have to learn from scratch what you don’t know regarding this craft and we are both aware, that’s a lot.”

Leia 2: “Oh. That. I see. Well then, I guess I am learning to listen to myself. I am listening and getting to know another side of me.

I guess I get to process everything that happens through it, be it positive or negative.

If it is negative, it’s like it becomes less threatening or painful after being filtered through my fineliner pens or poured in a sea of color and drowned in different layers of resin or retouched in Photoshop.

If it’s positive, it feels like another way of celebrating it, like looking at it from a whole new perspective, just to be able to relive it on another level.

Does this make sense to you?”

Leia 1: “Yes, you treat yourself through the arts. 

Leia 2: “I treat myself lovingly through the arts, it’s what I hope everyone will do, sooner or later.”