Here’s something you could try: Draw someone you love.
If you feel inadequate to the task, like me – especially when drawing my own son – all the better! Let this be an opportunity to take a “low skill, high sensitivity approach” to drawing. In other words, let your natural sensitivity be more important than your level of drawing skill. Maybe even let it be okay if your hand just does what it wants. Notice how it feels to attempt drawing someone you love. Is there a vulnerability? If so, sense the connection between your vulnerability and your love for the person you’re drawing, and keep drawing.
If there’s frustration, or anxiety, let them sensitize you, and keep drawing. Keep breathing and feeling. Take breaks, as needed, and write a few notes about what you’re experiencing. Then go back to drawing.
This is an experiment, not a test you can pass or fail. Just notice what’s happening, making a few more notes about your process along the way.
Feelings, memories, other images or associations?
Continue to draw until you feel complete for now.
For me, it’s much easier to let my drawing be “primitive” when I don’t identify as an “artist” in the conventional sense. I’m a maker. Everybody makes things. I like to see what happens when I make things, and feel what I feel. I see how things I make come alive, especially when I’m not judging them and I’m simply curious.
Once you’ve finished your drawing, read your notes and reflect on your process. Look closely at the image you’ve drawn. See it from far away, then close up again. Perhaps there’a a small detail you hadn’t noticed before?
Finally, spend a little more time just being with the image of your loved one. Do you sense how this contemplation might be a quiet act of love?
