"They say that when someone is sick and dying, with a heightened awareness that their days are numbered and few, they develop a new appreciation of little things. Things intensify and become special and precious. That view outside the window , that snowflake, that conversation, that kiss - each one could be your last. The trick is to incorporate this perspective into your healthy - though challenging - life. Drawing does that; you pay attention in a way you normally woudn't. Focus repels the distractions that muddle the experience. Every line, page, brick, unit of the thing you draw becomes essential. You're looking to catch each component in order to understand the construction of the object and therefore realize the beauty of it's balance, the necessity of each small part. You look and examine that thing with love. You desire to recognize every part to capture it in your drawing. You can feel security about your subject and at peace with recognizing the value of every little thing and moment in your life." ~ Patti Lynn Gregory

You Decorated My Life

What you spend years creating, others could destroy overnight. Create anyway. ~ Mother Teresa

That which is static and repetitive is boring. That which is dynamic and random is confusing. In between lies art. - John A. Locke

Art is a half-effaced recollection of a higher state from which we have fallen since the time of Eden. - Saint Hildegarde

Great art can communicate before it is understood. - T. S. Eliot

The artist must train not only his eye but also his soul. - Wassily Kaninsky

"Beauty conveys an intelligibility that is not reducible to scientific properties. For example, to see a rose and appreciate its beauty is to know it. I may know nothing of what a botanist could share with me about the organic properties of the flower. Nonetheless, the knowledge of the rose that I have is genuine. In fact, if I had studied botany and knew all the facts about roses, but had never seen and appreciated a rose, my knowledge of it — albeit scientific — would be incomplete."

From: http://www.ncregister.com/daily-news/true-beauty-satisfies-the-human-heart/#ixzz29nAwkgm

Do not depreciate your gifts

First, we must recognize that the true end of humility is not self-contempt (which still leaves people concerned with themselves). To paraphrase C. S. Lewis, humility does not consist in handsome people trying to believe they are ugly and clever people trying to believe they are fools. When Muhammad Ali announced that he was the greatest, there was a sense in which his pronouncement did not violate the spirit of humility. False modesty can actually lead to an ironic pride in one’s better-than-average humility. True humility is more like self-forgetfulness than false modesty. As my colleague Dennis Voskuil writes in his forthcoming book, Mountains into Goldmines: Robert Schuller and the Gospel of Success (Eerdmans), the refreshing gospel promise is “not that we have been freed by Christ to love ourselves, but that we are free from self-obsession. Not that the cross frees us for the ego trip but that the cross frees us from the ego trip.” This stripping-away leaves people free to esteem their special talents and, with the same honesty, to esteem their neighbor’s. Both the neighbor’s talents and one’s own are recognized as gifts and, like one’s height, are not fit subjects for either inordinate pride or se1f-deprecation. ~ Dr. Myers is professor of psychology at Hope College in Holland, Michigan ~ "'false humility' consists of deprecating one's own sanctity, gifts, talents, and accomplishments for the sake of receiving praise or adulation from others." ~

“If an ear is to grow or a flower blossom, there are times which cannot be forced; for the birth of a human being, nine months are required; to write a book or a worthy piece of music, years must often be spent in patient searching. This is also the law of the spirit… To encounter the mystery takes patience, inner purification, silence and waiting.” (Pope St. John Paul II; General Audience, July 26, 2000)

"You take it on faith, you take it to the heart. The waiting is the hardest part." ~ Tom Petty