Ojalá, Selah, Lateda

The Censor

As I’m reading the introductory chapters of The Artist’s Way the idea of a censor, “our own internalized perfectionist, a nasty internal and external critic, who resides in our brain and keeps up a constant stream of subversive remarks” rang true to me. I know exactly how that voice sounds. Silencing it, or least subduing it a bit sounds great to me. So since the book said drawing a cartoon version of it would help I drew three.

The first one I did was making the censor a prim little demon perched on my shoulder. She certainly looked like a “cunning foe,” but when I went to paste her in my notebook she didn’t seem right somehow. I reread the chapter and the suggestion to, “think of your Censor as a cartoon serpent slithering around your creative Eden, hissing vile things to keep you off guard.” So I went with serpent. My next drawing I like a lot. I think it captures well how immobilized I’ve been creatively for so many years. But in that drawing it looked like the Censor was winning and that just won’t do. So I tried one more time and I think I got it. So Censor beware. I’m ready to start fighting back.