Embrace the Mistakes

I did something I have never done before - and feel completely unqualified to do - but yet have wanted to try for years. My one week angel icon-painting class began at noon today. For the rest of the week the class will meet for roughly 13 hours/day at the Immanuel Icons Studio in the Highland Park neighborhood of Pittsburgh. Having arrived at 3 am this morning due to flight delay and bad weather, I was grateful for today's late start time.

The most helpful word of instruction that my esteemed teacher, Randi Sider-Rose, said was to celebrate and embrace the mistakes in our paintings even more than the successes because it is from mistakes that we learn the most: about such things as humility, grace, and correction.

I learned aLOT about humility today through my many mistakes! But I also feel free to make them, in order that I can keep learning. Otherwise, if we expected perfection of ourselves every time, how could we ever try something new? How could we learn? 

Speaking of figuring things out, as soon as I learn how to upload pictures onto the blog via my phone (without an Internet connection), I will share first glimpses of my first icon - very much a work in progress, just like me.

Here it is! This is actually taken at the end of Day 2. We have three days to go, so I expect the finished Raphael  angel to look quite different from the guy captured here. But he is well on his way!