I’ve been thinking about cycles a lot this year with my art practice. I’ve been trying to pay attention to shifting energies with the lunar and solar cycles as well as all the planetary retrogrades. It has brought me to think about what it means to complete something. In a cycle, when you complete something it is also a beginning. So a completion is not a finishing but a moving on to new territory. Many spiritual teachers like to say that you are always complete, but what is the relationship between being complete and also growing?

In the creative process, whether a work is complete or not is always up for scrutiny. As an artist, you are always thinking a few steps ahead and it can take time to see your own progress. To see the value in what you’ve created and stop and let it exist at that place. Like taking a photograph of a moment in time that keeps moving after you’ve clicked the shutter - which is the right moment to capture?

I think it is an instinct that is known without too much thought. A feeling of “yes” instead a feeling of restlessness. Sometimes it feels effortless which is also tricky because “it can’t be that easy”. But sometimes all you feel is restlessness and discontent, so you keep working (or not) until a more pleasant feeling comes. Some might wait until they feel something bubbling, or some may learn to tap into a flow better and more often. Sometimes the work is just about understanding your own personal cycles or what you need to get to that place of “yes”.

So maybe we are always complete and creating something complete, but we are also always revolving just like the sun and moon. We travel and interact with each other and ourselves, receive and give and then come back to our work where we collect it all in again - complete in a new way.