Life is a reason, not an excuse
Hello Fae-ries!
So……………….. today is RIDDLED with anxiety. I recently decided that Tuesday’s would be blog days to start out my week (tattoo artist weeks are sooo atypical) and since the anxiety is twitching its way through my veins I KNEW I needed to write about it. My anxieties are much more physical than they are emotional… its like my body is telling me that, “there is a cheetah over there and we need to RUN NOW!”… when really the aforementioned cheetah is a pile of clean clothes that needs to be put away, or a tattoo I am about to do that is pushing my skills, or writing a VERY public blog to all of the prospective clients and friends that I expect to trust me.
I titled this blog entry “Life is a reason, not an excuse” and that is very much what I am feeling. This anxiety is the REASON I need to write to you today, not an excuse to not. The second I (or any of us) start using our problems and shortcomings to make excuses for where we are, it will not only hold us back from the things we love and want to do… but it hinders us from truly living!
I recently had two very amazing clients come down from Duluth to come to the Oddities convention (it was basically a convention full of taxidermy creepies) and to get tattooed by me. The tattoo they wanted was a snail with an eyeball for a shell leaving a slime trail of frosting from a cute frosted donut. When they first told me about this idea I was, of course, intrigued because I love tattoos that are totally off kilter… but also, um… what?! Once I met these kick-ass ladies it all became clear. The snail was because they are obsessed with creepy things. Ok, got it. It was the donut part that has a more interesting story. A few years ago, one of them (we will call her Pink) was living in another state trying to decide between a cool life and guy in that location, and a cool life and guy in MN… and the situation was stressing. The other lady (call her Blue)… well Blue told Pink that she was basically behaving like a whiny kid in a donut store who can’t decide which delicious donut to get. Pink’s life was full of amazing opportunities and she just needed to pick a donut already because no matter what, she was going to end up with a freaking sugar coated, drool-inducing tasty treat! So they now use this as a reminder that life is full of crossroads and even if they don’t seem like it at first, going with your gut and working through the stress will always result in tasty results! Needless to say, I loved this idea (and them!) and will be trying to use this analogy as often as possible.
For me, my current donut problem is that this move to Minneapolis has been such an amazing boost in business… the tattoo community in Minnesota has been so supportive and amazing, and the clientele is plentiful and encouraging! The clientele is so plentiful in fact that I am having a hard time balancing it all… appointment requests, responding on time to everyone, booking people, fitting everyone in, and all the behind the scenes stuff like taxes and ordering supplies… oh and having a life outside of work too (that’s a thing people do, right?). So basically my anxiety is looking this gift horse right in the damn mouth, searching for its tonsils in fact. I am SO grateful and blessed that this community is excited about me and my work and I need to do everything I can to make sure I keep earning your support! I reached out to a life coach today, which to me is SO exciting and daunting. I am not great at relinquishing control, and I know this life coach is also going to make me get an assistant… but I need to pick a damn donut already, accept the help wherever my squad will give it and enjoy the sweet taste of raspberry flavored success (my donut of choice, of course, is the raspberry mousse filled one from next door at Glam Doll).
The odd quote of the week came from those same ladies, “It was a stuffed, taxidermy beetlejuice mouse!” … it was something they saw at the Oddities convention. That is certainly one of the most unique things I have ever pictured! So go out, use your quirky weirdness, your anxiety, your “insert issue here” and go be your own stuffed taxidermy beetlejuice mouse… the world needs you to pick a donut and live the life you want!
Love, Jordanne
PS. I also want to start including a Song of the Week. Music is SO important to me. And since my boys in the band Sweet Ascent just dropped a new single today, I’m gonna use them. It’s not their new single I want to point out though (even though its kick ass!)… my favorite song of theirs is Be Someone Today. It is so applicable to this post. Give them a listen, you won’t regret it.
