A Year at McGuffey’s: Goals, Expectations & Steve Albini

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Last year around this time I became part of the McGuffey Art Center Incubator Studio. I was given 1/6th of an old classroom in the red brick former school and the promise of an exhibit at the end of my ‘incubation’. That exhibit will open in June and my time as an incubator will end. But I hope my life as an artist and my affiliation with McGuffey’s will continue.

When I entered the program, I imagined six artists sharing a large space, working together, encouraging one another.  I imagined mentors gently guiding us and helping us integrate into the culture and politics of an art center that has been thriving for fifty years. I imagined myself being welcomed into a circle of supportive Charlottesville creatives. I imagined myself making friends, being part of a group, having inspiring conversations about process and technique. I knew the work I wanted to create and I knew exactly how I was going to create that work. My expectations and my excitement for the year were high. My goals were, I thought, admirable. And very, very rigid.

So it should be no surprise that this year as a McGuffey Incubator was not the year I imagined. The good news is, despite my kicking and screaming, despite my many attempts to force a square peg into a round hole, this year as a McGuffey Incubator has been so much more than what I imagined. 

And the insights I gained along the way have been liberating. I think the biggest insights have been around how our expectations can bind us to a particular mindset. The expectations I set for my year at McGuffey Art Center before the year even began did not consider the expectations my five fellow incubators. My expectations chained me to a specific idea of how things should be without offering room to shift and grow. My expectations were limiting. The fear/jealousy/longing that I stewed in from time to time was limiting. Even the goals I set for myself were limiting. 

But we’re taught to set goals from the moment we’re born. If we don’t have goals for our life, then who are we? What are we? Aimless? Lazy? So I’ve always been a huge goal setter. Yet every time I failed to achieve a set goal and every time I met a goal I found myself spiraling out of control. And I never understood why.  

What I needed was this quote from Steve Albini, the record producer who died this month. I found it while reading Austin Kleon’s weekly newsletter:

“I’ve lived my whole life without having goals, and I think that’s very valuable, because then I never am in a state of anxiety or dissatisfaction. I never feel I haven’t achieved something. I never feel there is something yet to be accomplished. I feel like goals are quite counterproductive. They give you a target, and until the moment you reach that target, you are stressed and unsatisfied, and at the moment you reach that specific target you are aimless and have lost the lodestar of your existence. I’ve always tried to see everything as a process. I want to do things in a certain way that I can be proud of that is sustainable and is fair and equitable to everybody that I interact with. If I can do that, then that’s a success, and success means that I get to do it again tomorrow.”

If I’d read this twelve months ago I wonder if my experience as a McGuffey Incubator would be different? Because every time I do read his words it’s as if a window in my mind has been opened and a fresh breeze comes through to remind me that I am free to live my life with intention. And a life lived with intention is not corralled by goals and objectives and deadlines. 

There will be a new crop of McGuffey Incubators moving in to the studio in July. If I were to offer any advice it would be this: let go of expectation, let go of goals, enjoy the process and the adventure. The year flies by and if you open your heart and your mind and are ready to embrace the unexpected you’ll be amazed at what can happen.

The Incubator Show opens on First Friday, June 7th, from 5:30-8:00 PM. If you’re in the Charlottesville area please join us at McGuffey Art Center, 201 2nd Street Northwest.

Also…I have a new website for my art! 

Leaving Home: A Climate Migrant’s Story

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When I left California the first time, it seemed like a lot of folks had a similar idea. Around the time I took flight for Ireland, Dana and Anya left for Grand Rapids and Nancy headed to Santa Fe. There were others, too, who left. Friends on the periphery of my life headed to Oregon and my the friend who adopted my cat Bob moved to Detroit.

In the late 1990’s, if you weren’t in the tech industry, it felt like life was waiting for you someplace else. So we moved. 

A decade later I came back to the place that felt like home. I guess the Universe knew that the Bay Area had more lessons to teach me. Some of those lessons devastated me. Others filled me with hope and motivated me to not only do better but to be better. To be more kind. More patient. More trusting. 

I purchased my first home through Palo Alto’s BMR program during my second time around in the Bay Area. And I fell into the kind of love that is more than a fleeting tickle in the heart.

My beloved B (henceforth known as ‘BB’) and I first tossed around the idea of leaving California long before COVID changed the way we live. But when last summer served us a shutdown, raging firestorms, intense heat and The Day the World Turned Orange we knew it was time to flesh out what it would look like to leave. What it would mean.

So we created a spread sheet that ranked our potential destinations according to the criteria that was most important to us. We wanted to be closer to family but we also needed affordability, diversity, culture, tolerable winters and, while BB could continue to work remotely, I needed opportunities to continue on my path as a yoga therapist and coach. I also needed room to grow back into the artist side of me I abandoned when I left California the first time. Asheville was too expensive and Chapel Hill too far from family. We didn’t relish the idea of a Pittsburgh winter and potential livelihood for me was sketchy in Richmond. 

But Charlottesville, Virginia? Charlottesville ticked enough of the boxes to warrant an exploratory visit.  By the end of our seven day visit last May, we knew where we wanted to live.

It isn’t Charlottesville. It’s a little town (to be truthful it isn’t a town, it’s a place and yes, there’s a difference) outside of Charlottesville called Crozet. Crozet is named after Colonel Claudius Crozet, the French engineer who built the Blue Ridge Tunnel. The community we’re moving to is near enough Charlottesville to take advantage of all it has to offer but far enough away from city lights so that we can see the stars at night. Maybe even the occasional shooting star.

But we won’t move into our new home until next June. Which gives me just enough time to circle ‘round back about a million times to the question, “Are we making the right decision?”