I've been Kershisniked

I found out that Kershisniked is an actual term people use to describe what happens when they discover Brian Kershisnik's paintings and fall in love with them. Here are a few of my favorite paintings by him: 

Gardening in the Rain
 This one is me when I try to control things in my life too much and forget that God has it covered already.

This Splendid Inconvenience

Lovers with Injuries

Women with Houses

Making Progress

Making Progress

Then I found this article by Brian Kershisnik and I think I loved that as much as I loved his paintings. Because he got it. He captured how I feel about being a therapist. It's a bit of a leap to translate what he said about being a painter into therapy work and being a therapist, but it totally works for me. 




I Know I Don't Know What I'm Doing

Utah Museum of Fine Arts Lecture
February 24, 2007
In a sense more profound than I can say, I don't know what I am doing. When people learn that I am a painter and ask me what I paint, I have difficulty answering. Usually the inquirers are seeking only a short answer and must be embarrassed or annoyed at my stumbles and what must look like attempts to conceal something. I used to acknowledge (only to myself) that I was stalling for the arrival of a clearer understanding, but gradually the reality of my authentic ignorance became clear to me. I hope that my responses since then have become less ridiculous and not less illuminating, and I will here make another attempt.
My current conclusion as to what I paint is that I don't know and I'm trying to be more at peace with the awkward reality. I do not mean by this that I think I am a bad painter. I am, in fact, one of my favorite painters. No one's artwork moves me as often to tears or laughter, insight and revelation, ecstatic discovery, and joyful or fearful views of the truth as does my own. No doubt this has something to do with the fact that I am heavily involved in its production. My experiences of surprise and discovery occur not because I am painting about something I have learned and am trying to explain but rather something I am trying to understand myself, the problem of being this particular human being in progress. I don't paint people to show who they are, but as part of trying to discover who they are, and I believe I fall in love with every one of them. The questions involved in a painting, if I know them at all, are very difficult to articulate. By acting with the tools of my trade I follow a hunch in search of a question and, in this process, often unexpectedly and even unintentionally, something of another world, of the other world, something of God leaks out. Then whether my abilities are frail or splendid, they are either way woefully inadequate and that is exactly where I want to be. Painting for me is anxious disciplined pursuit, trying to sense when and how much to get out of the way so that what is coming can come. It is not expected or even possible to remove myself completely. They are my hands, with my quirks, my weaknesses and capacities. It is my sense of humor or tragedy, composition, color or material. The benevolence, indifference, or even malevolence of each idea must be discerned in a process which can take days, weeks, or years. One's abilities can be and are often augmented but are seldom generated from nothing. We must bring all we have, and are seeking to improve, to the table. And through this salad of faith and work, one never does, must never, get it down or reduce it to an easily regurgitatable process. To do so would be to sever the unbilicus. As I get older, and more experienced, my sense of what to pursue or discard gets better as does my appreciation for the sacred state of not knowing exactly what I'm doing, just knowing I should be doing it. I hope this extends to every aspect of my life and every relationship in and out of the studio. Life is much bigger than I am, and so it would be surprising if I felt that I knew what I was doing. What is truly surprising is the sensation that comes to me that I should be doing what I am doing. Hanging on to this sensation often takes more power than I possess, yet like an act of grace, it persists unbelievably.