I Can’t Paint, I Can’t Write, I Can’t Sing by Cathy Zunker

The things we say to ourselves!

When I find a new self-help, self-awareness, self-improvement book, I can read them fairly quickly. Many of the points are things that I’ve studied and thought about before. So in the process of reading and doing the writing exercises in the book called Self Matters, there weren’t a lot of new ideas … very common-sensical – step by step … exercises … a logical thought process … and then BAM! I didn’t even see it coming! I started putting all of my written assignments together. My positive self-talk wasn’t as positive as I thought it was. Frankly, I was stunned. The conversation went like this: "My self talk is positive all the time! I am not being negative when I say to myself that I’m not artistic … for me, it’s just the plain truth … I just can’t paint!"

The conversation in my head about writing went like this: " I know that I’m a speaker, but a speaker is something entirely different from writing – with writing you have to use words for every ounce of feeling – and I can’t use words … I use my facial expressions and body language. I can’t write!"

Same thought process with singing "I can’t sing".

Now that I had the ‘aha’ moment of discovery what was I going to do about it?

I bought paints … I started on a wall, behind a door …without anyone knowing. That piece of wall has about 20 pounds of paint from all the times I got frustrated and had to cover up my frightful attempts. Now I have painted murals on walls and practically turned my world upside down with paint …

One very tiny bathroom in our house never got used – it was so ugly! Who would want to sit in it? I painted this little room sky blue and then proceeded to turn the walls into a tropical island. There is a hideous PVC pipe that runs up the wall that is camouflaged now as a palm tree. The room is complete with an aqua-blue ocean, a sand beach, an umbrella, a cruise ship coming into port, and a bucket of Corona sitting in the sand. A miniature hammock holds a spare roll of toilet paper. Two strips of oak create an enclosed space on the floor around the back side of the toilet and that three-inch deep area is now filled with white beach sand! Guess what? This tiny bathroom gets used now and my husband has been trying to convince me that I should paint professionally!

I discovered that I have always been able to paint, ‘knowing’ it inside, has changed my entire world.

After painting … is writing. My book is scheduled to be in print by March.

Singing: In reality everyone can sing! Not only that … studies have shown even if you just sing with the radio, you improve. I received from my sister a beautifully framed piece of artwork that says, "Use what talents you possess. The woods would be very silent if no birds sang except those that sang best."

Now I sing all the time – with the radio, with CDs … with or without music. And someday … someday I might just test those wings too …

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