Visit the collection at emilyjeffords.com
 
Step into the studio for a bit.  Let's catch up and talk about the new collection of artwork I have created, "Quiet Adventure".   In this episode, I share my process and favorite methods to create and release a collection of artwork. 
 
This body of work came together slowly and gently, a form of meditation and healing over the past 20+ months.  There are paintings in this collection I worked on as my baby was crawling around my feet, others I created as a refuge from my own home as we shelter-in-place.  This body of work was created selfishly as an act of self-care, but it is also for you.  I hope the theme of love and adventure and peace fill you too. 
 
"Quiet Adventure"
 
I walked through a field. 
It was new to me, but I knew it already.
The earth smelled like childhood.
The grasses clung to my bare feet in familiar ways.
The only thing unknown was the landscape.  
 
She was vast and led to places I have not been.
Adventure, we call it.
Unknowing.
But in the unknowing is a deep self-knowing.  
Trust in my body.  Trust in my mind.  
Trust in the bravery I have shown.  
Knowing that I will be brave again.
 
Even when the landscape unnerves me
with the edges she is asking me to explore.
Even when Adventure wraps itself in unfamiliar foliage.
 
I step outside of my mind
and the endlessness of my concerns
to focus on each footfall.
Moss.
Small blooms to be avoided (they are too pretty to squish).
A deep hole just the right size for a snake.
A rock to climb.  Then another.
A cliff.
We’re a little too high now.
A rusty-red puddle.
The sound of wind in the thousand-mile-field.
 
Mindfulness, they call this; the act of focusing on the present moment.
I call it a Quiet Adventure. 
And it is all so quiet and so beautiful I cannot breathe. 
I cannot breathe so I take big, cavity-filling breaths.  
Imprinting the scent and textures on my soul.  
Consuming it in thirsty eyefuls.  
Scooping it up and tucking it in
and asking it to stay with me.
 
I walked through a field that was wholly unfamiliar to me.  
But I knew myself in it.  I knew that I would be brave.
I knew I would let it change me.
 
 
Music at the end written and performed by Half Measure