Before I get started: if you're based in Gothenburg, make sure to check out my new 4-week course "Making Stress Less Art for Beginners” starting on 7 September. There are still some spots left, and I would love to meet you and paint together.
Do you remember what it was like being a teenager? There were some undeniable benefits: just school, hanging out with my friends, my mother did all the cooking and all the laundry, none of the worries about mortgages and taxes, or the inevitability of death. Good times!
But OMG, the insecurities!
What will other people think when I wear this or do that? How do I get the guy I like to like me back? Who am I, and if so, how many? I definitely do not want to go back to that.
Figuring ourselves out is a long and hard process. When I was 30, I thought I'd completed the assignment. Now at 40, I know there's no such thing. We continue to change, our values change, our goals, our priorities. So you never really “get there”, I guess.
It does get easier with time. To stop pretending to be somebody you're not for the sake of others. To not be embarrassed by the things you like, and the things you think. To embrace the full glory of your wonderful freaky weird self.
The Activity: Design your own Freak Flag
Letting your Freak Flag fly, means to proudly advertise who you are, and what you stand for. Today, we'll design our very own flag to represent the wonderful land of.. us.
Step 1 - The Ingredients
A flag is made up of few things - colours and symbols. Think about those things separately. First, which colours represent who you are? Are you more about rainbows or black on black? Or somewhere in between (looking at you, you beautiful Pastel Goths!)? There are no rules or limitations here, if your playlist includes Cannibal Corpse as well as Nicki Minaj then that's what we're going with!
Now think about the symbols, that could represent your unfiltered awesomeness?
Here are some random ideas to get you going: a unicorn, a crown, a pentagram, a circle, a bird, a peace sign, a middle finger, a flower, a dragon, a mountain, a triangle, the knights of the Jedi order, or maybe the dark side after all?
Step 2 - Design the flag
Draw your flag using the colours and symbols you've chosen. Ideally, of course, you could paint this straight onto an old bed sheet and hang it proudly out of your window for the world to see. More realistically, you can draw this on a piece of paper, or make a digital collage.
Keep your flag in your mind as you go about your week. Whenever a situation comes up, where you want to edit yourself or tune yourself back, make sure you wave that thing high instead.
My Example
Welcome to Stress Less Land! Where the coloured pencil rules, the skies are bright with colours, the world is full of happy little trees, there are no mistakes, just happy little accidents, and Bob Ross is our messiah.
That's not so freaky, you might think. But the girl I (thought) I was 20-odd years ago would have run way from anything pink, because that was for "girly girls", which decidedly at the time I was not. She also didn't care much about spending time in nature, because that was boring and uncool. And she had already traded in pencils for beers a while ago. It took a couple of decades to find my way back here, to the land of rainbows and unicorns, love and peace and punk music, and to not care care a little less what others think about that.
Have a fabulous week you beautiful freaks. Remember, we are cringe but we are legion!
Love, Lorena