A matter of Perspective

Hello, dear reader!

So its my turn to chat with you this week...a few wise words from the wifey!

As some of you will be aware, one of my hobbies is to do paint-by-numbers paintings.

In Between The Lions
Its something I started to do during my breakdown in 2021, because basically I needed something to focus on (and something to keep my hands busy), a way of coping with stress that wasn't maladaptive. I started off quite basic with a very brightly coloured lion, which straight away proved both relaxing and distracting - and miraculously transformed my flighty mind trips to something really creative.

 

Unfortunately these kits aren't free (they should be on prescription), but you can easily get them on Amazon for about 7 quid, which pleased my miserly husband, and didn't exactly break the bank. I began doing about one about every fortnight.

Lessons In Art
After a few brightly coloured creatures and simple animals - usually cats, I moved on to paintings that challenged me a little more. Painting became my personal therapy tool, one that really clever clinical psychologists and the like talk about. It focussed my erratic thoughts, and eventually stopped my self harming tendencies.

The more difficult the paintings became—intricate flowers, butterflies, scenery, and in more recent days gothic skeletons—the more this theory proved true

During the few weeks these paintings take to complete, I watch and wait as the picture unfolds with every session,. Often I don't really know what some detail I'm painting actually is until I step back and look from a distance (a flower? A hand? A small bird?). I often leave very dark or very light colours until last, so that when they are added, the picture just comes alive, like magic.

Like so many things in life, this particular hobby is not only something creative and beautiful, it's also something full of life lessons.

In The Detail
There are some very clever people who say life is very much like a blank canvas, something that only we have the pallette to complete. The act of painting intricate parts of a bigger picture is challenging, because you don't always know what one small detail can mean in terms of the whole.

This so often happens in life, and its has definitely happened in mine. Those intricate details, often unseen at first, have made the greatest impact on me. Unseen acts of kindness. Smiles you didn't expect. Those somewhat random actions that when put together, made a monumentally positive impact on my life, and my mental wellbeing.


Until next time.

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Hey, there! If you enjoyed reading any of the above, why not take a look at some of my published work? Below you’ll find links to a number of short stories I’m lucky enough to have included in anthologies. I’d love to know what you think.


New Tales Of Old


Death Ship


Pestilence: Drabbles 1


Reaperman: Drabbles 3


The Musketeers Vs Cthulhu


Eldritch Investigations