The other night I was driving through the city. As I pulled up to a stop sign a girl was crossing the street. At first glance there wasn’t anything unique about her. But as she walked closer and passed under the glow of a street lamp, her paint-covered pants lit up like a Jackson Pollock painting under a museum spotlight.
In that moment, you couldn’t help but feel them taunting you,
I’ve spent my day pouring my soul into the world, how have you spent yours?
She was literally covered in creativity.
I couldn’t look away.
Those pants made you want to stop the car and ask her a thousand questions.
About her day.
About her life.
About how she finds the courage to pour herself out like that.
Seeing someone literally clothed in their creativity has this interesting way of making you jealous (or maybe pine is a better word). Because the gap between that type of vulnerability—that depth of expression of self and spirit—and the spiritless days we often spend sheltering ourselves from the world becomes undeniable.
It hurts to acknowledge that gap.
Those moments are like flashes in a dark room. Where for a split second someone turns the light on and you can see everything for what it truly is. The way things are supposed to be seen and the way life is supposed to be lived.
It’s the contrast between who we are and who we know we can be that awakens us, awakens our spirit.
It’s in those moments — when we allow ourselves to be honest with ourselves about the state of our being (the good and the otherwise), that we begin to uncover a sense of who we truly are.
It’s not easy to be honest and vulnerable. To confess how we truly feel about ourselves and the life we are painting.
It’s hard to admit it to ourselves, let alone anyone else. Yet we need these close encounters with lives potently lived to break open our present reality.
It’s in those moments that the door of vulnerability softly drifts open and invites us to put on a fresh pair of jeans, step into the version of life we were always meant to be living, and let the paint fly.