I am an artist.

Words are beautiful. Words are powerful.

I have always had a fascination with words. Even as a child I attempted to use words that were far beyond the normal vocabulary of my age ("Mom, will it snow if it's cold enough and there is perspiration?" "You mean precipitation?"). There is something SO freeing about the ability to find a word that perfectly articulates a thought or a feeling. A perfect word that encompasses every aspect of a feeling is like a key that unlocks the door of understanding (and often being understood).

Today I started to understand how the equation of my love for words and my love for people yields a passion for the field of counseling. Counseling is often misperceived as merely listening, or giving advice. But counseling is much more than that...it is taking on the task of listening to an individual's thoughts, needs, desires, fears, emotions, and frustrations...understanding them....detecting themes... and placing such themes into a few intentional and concise words. The perfect word or sentence allows him or her to feel genuinely understood. There is also a certain sense of validity that is felt when an abstract concept, such as an emotion, can have an understandable label slapped on it. A word or two can offer such comfort and freedom and feelings of normalcy.

I have often found myself frustrated with my lack of ability to express myself artistically. I hear artists talk about the therapeutic freedom they gain from painting, sculpting, or drawing, yet I am able to do none of these forms of creative expression. But I am learning that words truly are an art. Fiction is hard for me to write, but my feelings and thoughts and ponderings are not. This blog is my form of painting.

I write how I hear it in my head, then revise it a bit to find the perfect word. Or sometimes I don't revise it. I know that some of my sentences are grammatically incorrect, and that's okay. Sometimes it sounds better in my head that way. That is my artistic freedom! So what if I want to address myself with a lowercase "i," write in bullet point format, make up words, connect thoughts with a dot dot dot, or write about things that no one cares about. I am an artist.

That said, I have no perfect word or sentence to conclude this post, so count this as my conclusion. Cheers.