Excitement versus Passion

I've been thinking a lot this week about the difference between excitement and passion. My whole life I have had a tendency to get very excited about upcoming projects and the possibilities of things to come. My anticipation level gets very high when trying out new and exciting things. But as I'm getting older and I start having problems with blood pressure, and other physical ailments, I'm starting to rethink about how I have previously used my excitement, and my emotions, to press forward and drive myself toward a project and its completion. In a sense, getting excited is wearing me out. I don't want to stop caring about things, about projects and about causes, but I am having to approach it differently now..

I realize that I'm still passionate about things, but what is that dividing line between excitement and passion? For me, when I get excited about a project it becomes all consuming. I think about it as I lay in bed. I think about it as I make my meals. I think about it at the quiet moments of the day and while I'm painting in my studio. I'm finding, at this point in my life, the all consuming quality of excitement needs to change. I need to switch my gears and let passion be that driving force. The difference between excitement and passion, to me, is that excitement has to do with a lot of energy, movement and activity. But the point of excitement is that it's not necessarily focused. In the past I would hype myself up about a project and it didn't matter whether I was focused or not - if there was enough energy it would move me forward. To me, passion is much more focused. It is not about wildness, or ecstatic-ness. It is much more deep-seated than that. Passion is not something that you have to think about all the time. It is there, when it is needed. I don't have to build an environment of energy when something is coming from my heart. I am moving forward now because of my passions, not because of my excitement for something. Each painting is becoming more focused on it’s meaning and expression.

Oftentimes, the painting that I'm most excited about, as I start a new series of paintings, is usually the one that I like the least at the end. In my excitement I forget to think about certain aspects of the painting. Maybe in my haste the composition wasn't plotted out right. Maybe the energy patterns didn't quite capture what I was experiencing in the landscape. Maybe the coloring wasn't deeply felt enough for the harmonies to resonate and to express their relationships. But with passion it seems that there is more time to think about my art, more time to feel about my art, and time to make decisions to come to a successful completion - even if the clock doesn’t indicate that the process has been any longer.

I feel like the four paintings that I delivered to Gallery 360 in April (one which is featured in this newsletter above) we're just that. I didn't get hyped-up going into the studio to paint these paintings. I was happy to go paint them, and happy to spend time on them. My passion for the subject matter and for the process of painting made it easier to commit to my decisions and it was a much more satisfying process.