free spirit?

I was talking on the phone with my boyfriend about my blog tonight when he asked about my about me section where I refer to myself as a "free spirit."

"Do you think you're a free spirit?"

I paused.

"No, I think I want to be a free spirit."

And that's the truth. I'm actually a 20 something that over analyzes everything and probably wouldn't say no if offered a Xanax.

I'm willing to admit that I'm not as much the go with the flow runs through a field of wildflowers while wearing paisley kind of girl that I would like to be. I am creative though, and this part of me has always been there flowing through my veins.

When I was little I pretended the thermostat was a key pad where I had to enter a secret code to get into the "lab," a.k.a. room where the computer was. In elementary I fumbled through most subjects but soared when it came time to do creative writing. Then of course there was always my room which I redid practically every time my mood changed (which is pretty often). At age seven I marched up to my parents and told them I wanted to feel like I was in a lemonade glass. So I sifted through the Benjamin Moore color wheel until I found the perfect lemony shade to paint my walls. When junior high rolled around I was going through a darker (weren't we all?) more bohemian phase and I guess deep eggplant colored walls seemed like the best way to the tell the world, "I'M SO ABOVE THIS." I filled the floor with giant richly colored Moroccan inspired floor pillows and spent my days sitting on them reading magazines and pretending I was anywhere but Arlington, Texas. Then in high school I was so deeply inspired by a picture I saw of the Tibi designers living room that I had to pay homage to it by recreating it in own room. I bought a poster board and begin filling it with magazine clippings and other sources of inspiration for the room redo. I checked every fabric store until I found the perfect shade of highlighter yellow fabric for the curtains. I returned lamps I had my heart set on because I realized the angular lines clashed with the nightstand and it needed to have a more round shape to contrast it. 

That room is my baby. Every single thing had so much thought put into it and so much love behind it. When I think about it, that room redo was the last time I felt truly creatively fulfilled and inspired. As cheesy as it may sound, I feel like there's a part of me creatively that I'm just not tapping into. Somewhere in the shuffle of the everyday it got lost and I'm realizing more and more it's because I'm not seeking after it. Most of the time I think creativity doesn't descend upon us but rather comes from us chasing after it. At some point I stopped running towards it and pushing myself out of my comfort zone. I'm thinking about what I can do to put myself back in that head space and what I need to let go of in order to move forward towards whatever lies ahead.

"In order to live a fascinating life – one brimming with art, music, intrigue, and romance – you must surround yourself with precisely those things."

In the mean time, here are some pretty pictures :)