Pain with a purpose...what it's all about

As an artist, I believe you can't separate your art from your life.  This blog is about sharing our physical and/or emotional pain with stories and in a collaborative art project.  Looking for some positive aspects of dealing with pain is challenging, right?  The day to day way it can wear you out is sometimes overwhelming and has changed our lives.  

So here's what I'm hoping you will join me in creating...and NO you don't have to be an artist to join!  The back brace pictured will be covered with pins bloggers send me creating the look of beadwork in the colored areas on the outside.  Glass-headed pins will be pushed through the front and protrude into the center.  When the project is complete, it will be hung and exhibited with your story if you choose to share it.  

So how do we start?  Share a 3-4 sentence story about your pain...any kind...here.  Of course, you can say more, just know that the abridged story will be the one used when it comes time for exhibition.  To be a part of the art, send one box of multi-colored glass-headed straight pins, any length, to the P. O. Box indicated.  Your pins represent your pain.  You can be as involved as you want.  Just blog, just send pins, share both as part of the story of Share Your Pain.  Care to join me??

Glass-headed pins can be purchased at any craft or sewing store and purchasing them and mailing them will cost around $5-6.  If they don't say glass, they aren't; plastic just won't hold up.  

Keep checking back to hear the stories and the progress on the art project.  Let's make our pain have a purpose!  

I'll start:  I've been experiencing chronic severe pain in my back, hips, and throughout my body as a result of disc issues and fibromyalgia for several years.  This has impacted daily activities (sitting, standing, sleeping, eating...you name it), my family, being able to find a job that can accommodate my limits, and making my art.  And this Christmas, I'm also facing the loss of my adoptive daughter who suffered from chronic medical and mental health issues and suddenly passed away in July.  Share Your Pain was supposed to be about my physical pain, but it just wasn't moving forward for a lot of reasons.  I realized that what I really wanted to do was share my pain to make some kind of sense of it.