Roots and Limbs

A while ago, I heard of an art journaling technique called "the inspiration wheel." You place your name in the center of a piece of paper, and you draw four or five spokes out from your name to names of artists who inspire you. Then, you do research on each of those people, and find two or three names of people who inspire them. Then, do some more research, and find out the people who inspired the people who inspire you (and so on, and so on). You are left with a paper covered with names of people whose work you can reference for inspiration on your projects.

I thought this was a really cool idea, and had wanted to do it for a while but had never sat down to actually write them all down. I knew who were in the starting positions (Jim Henson, Vincent Van Gogh and Lin-Manuel Miranda were fighting for pole position), but I hadn't had a chance to research who had inspired them.

The other day, I had a few hours on my hands while proctoring a training event, so I sat down to write out my inspiration circle. Instead of a circle, however, what emerged in my journal was a tree, full of quotes and artists of all genres whose work I find inspiring. Then I found myself writing out the media in which I like to work in among the leaves and other doodles on the page. Out of the trunk of the tree I wrote out the sprawling roots -- the themes that support the work I do and the work I find inspiring.

The finished product (which is not pictured below -- this was about half-way through) is a journal 2-page spread that I know I am going to be referencing for quite some time. There's a lot of information that came out in this exercise. I am looking forward to diving deeply into it.

I hope you enjoy this trip through my brain. I'm sure a lot of future blog posts are going to come out of this exercise. I encourage you to take a minute and think about your own inspiration circles (or trees!) and draft yours. You never know what might come from it.

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Curious about my finished design?

-- I highlighted the names of artists I truly admire in pink. There are a lot of artists (and poets, actors, musicians, authors, etc.) listed here, but I only highlighted the ones whose work has moved me to tears. (A friend of mine, a very talented pastor and artist, once said that when something moves you to tears, then the Lord is at work in your heart. I loved that sentiment, so I used it here.) Some of those names are (in no particular order): Vincent Van Gogh, Lin-Manuel Miranda, Jim Henson, Leslie Carrara-Rudolph, Christopher Jackson, Elle Luna, Elizabeth Gilbert, Christine Sun Kim, and Sadao Watanabe.

-- Orange highlights were for overarching themes that I am wrestling with right now: finding strength in your wounds, truth, beauty, joy, and "How long will you wait to honor who you are?" (quote by Elle Luna in her book, "The Crossroads of Should and Must." [oh, speaking of... I should post a library list at some point of inspirational books... note to self.]

-- Green highlights were used in the leaf doodles (because it was fun) and for underlining the root themes of my work: Support through depression, simplicity, strong design, spiritual, authenticity, and illumination. I also underlined "Inspiration comes in a multitude of ways" because it ties the roots to the tree.

-- The blue cloud says, "The Wound is the place where the Light enters you," a quote by Rumi. Also a major theme in the work I want to do.

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