Maybe it’s because I’m left-handed, but I crave time in the right brain.
In my day job, as a data engineer, I spend a lot of time in my left brain. The left brain is like an excel spreadsheet, with each piece of information in a neat grid. I know I’m using my left brain if I feel rigid. Coding requires that one focus with intensity, like a hot spotlight rather than warm ambient light. Often, if I’ve been away from a piece of code for a while, I go through a slow recollection process, reviewing notes from months before. I’m re-filling the left brain with data, so that I can continue down a narrow linear path.
One thing I’ve observed about my brain when I’m coding is that after eight hours straight, I’m mentally dehydrated. My mind has spent so much time in an analytical pattern that I have very little left to say. At dinner, my kids might be chatting about bands and my husband might be describing a book he read, but I feel conversationally empty. Secretly, I might be thinking about my code, ruminating on ways to improve my function.
By contrast, when I paint, I get to dive into the deep ocean of the right brain. When I open my painting kit and begin to touch the brushes, paints and papers, a feeling of happiness comes over me. In this blissful state, I am usually pondering the shapes and colors. Ideas and feelings flit through the air. I don’t know if other people also feel their brain expand when they are considering an image, but that is my experience. I feel the universe push outward, in an endless possibility.
Unlike math, art has no definitive answers. When I mix paint, for example, I know I’ll never get the same color I got the time before. Maybe I’ll get something interesting, more green, or blue, this time. Maybe I’ll accidentally spill some medium that makes a better sheen. Though, statistically, each new painting is probably going to be like past paintings, I still have childish hope that I’ll do better this time. I think most artists start every work with a thrill because anything could happen. Unpredictability is part of the charm of the right brain.
The truth about painting is that one can do a lot of philosophical thinking while one works. If I paint for five hours, that’s five hours of wide-open brain. I can think about anything—the colors, the image, what a friend said last week, my dad’s visit, what shows to apply to, or the old favorite, the meaning of life and whether one has achieved anything worth noting. Maybe I am a little kooky, but I can talk to myself for hours about many subjects while I paint. Afterward, I am eager to talk to someone else, probably my husband, about all my thoughts. I’m ready for a glass of wine and a deep conversation.
If it sounds like I’m saying that art is better than engineering, that’s not necessarily the case. Engineering can make one use every last bit of brain power, so that afterward, there is a quiet personal victory just for persevering. Pushing one’s brain to the limit produces bliss. Unfortunately, the bliss is private because talking about code bores the hell out of everyone on the planet.
Maybe it’s because I’m left-handed, but I crave time in the right brain. Part of why I paint is not for the final image, but for the happiness of the work. When I pick up my brush, I feel that I am meeting an old friend for a new conversation. With my mind blasted open, I let intuition take me where it will, out onto the ocean, far away from the grid of everyday life.
