Considerations and doubts

Every time I look at my work, I'm not sure if I like looking at it or not. Sometimes it looks so close...and other times, so god damned far off from where I want to go. While I keep telling myself I'm working towards it, I can't beat away the million doubts that rush me. I mean- how do I know? Maybe I'm driving myself in circles again. If I look towards human history to account for my own, I really have to question whether progress is possible at all. My mind scrambles to account for a million different things, between materials and subject matter... some areas are limited and forced into ultimatum; do I start a piece with a 'plan' and allow that to go into disarray or do I start with the usual familiar chaotic strokes? Right now I lead more toward the latter; I want not only my images, but my paintings, to follow the same patterns that life does. While the movement of the stroke is chaos (just like the initial conception of children- all those sperm going for the egg) once that stroke is put down it can't be revoked, and the dna starts to meld- and that's what one has to work with. But then I think of scale, and am I useing a direct or indirect method? There seem to be so many directions, that sometimes its hard to move at all.

Slow building

Slowly it gets less frustrating. Finishing off a recent group of paintings, I felt myself breath, feeling like much like a farmer whose been working the ground and finally seeing what may be something sprouting. Over the past year I'm realizing what I've been doing with myself by upturning this comfortable, habitual painting process I had- and finding a way to progress but integrate this. The 'this' is imagination, working from the suggestions of a random brush stroke. Attempting to combine this with intentional imagery, or even working from life has been overwhelming. I'm finding it wise to set a plan with the understanding from the outset that the plan is vague and there is plenty of room to move and change within it. I suppose I see the same things I go through in painting reflected in various areas of life, and perhaps I even believe this to be one of the essential aspects of painting.
Painters primarily concerned with the final result baffle me. Though their methods do appear too methodical for me, mostly I just don't understand that. I've said and thought- I don't want to paint what I see- I want to paint what I can't see so that I get to see it. Layering the paint has been the biggest change... but jesus, I would much like to rest in an area of change for awhile and have the steady satisfaction I once did. Slow and steady..

Just to keep working

In a rush right now...got about ten minutes before I got to the place where I haul people in and out and then move their dirty dishes. I'm starting to sicken of my perpetual self-righteousness- that I see so much work and my reaction is, "What am I looking at?" and I think, jesus, people are putting out such careless crap that I could put a little of my efforts into something and in comparison it would still be something more. More what? More genuine. More well-constructed. But that is comparison and that is not the point. I remind myself now- I need to work privately, and people don't need to know my woes or deep gouging frustrations- and if I show work that I personally find to be sub-par, I am dropping down to that level myself, to compete and be seen- when what I know I need to work for is to see for myself and translate this in a comprehensive enough fashion that I can stand by my work and firmly know that this is the best I'm doing and it ought to be seen. Just to keep working, when there is no promise of some far off sense of completion.