Coming Home...

This idea of "home" intrigued me for quite some time. Only recently I came to realize that this was something I was searching for my entire life. I remember, even as a child I used to have this strange melancholy and nostalgic feeling like something was missing. It was that strange feeling at the pit of your stomach, that pang for something else but that something else always eluded me. Strange thinking back on this now as an adult because as a child this is not something that is "normal" to think about. I would lay on the grass and stare into the night sky wondering what was out there and if there were other places like where I was and whether there was another version of me out there thinking the same thing. I used to think maybe I was missing "home" because we moved so much and we lost our "home" when I was a little kid during the war.

I have only recently realized that home was not a place, it's not something tangible and it's not found in a country, a city, a neighborhood or another human. The last 5 or so years for me have been a journey towards spirituality and peeling back all of those layers of societal and cultural expectations to find Biljana. I do want to clarify something; when I speak about spirituality here, I am not speaking about religion. That's something entirely different and something I never resonated with. Some people use these interchangeably and that's ok but it's not how I think about it. I began reading and researching more of the esoteric subjects but also more scientific subjects like physics and quantum mechanics. My version of spirituality seems to be very much linked with physics and quantum mechanics. This even lead to some interesting conversations with a friend on the meaning of nothing. I guess we were searching for the same thing. Turns out nothing is a very deep subject and nothing is truly everything. :)

I don't want to bore you with a long story of self discovery besides that it lead me to finally find home and that home is something I had all along...ME! Home is being a truly authentic self, not being afraid to be you and knowing that everything is connected. We are all one in this universe and love is the power house within. The love I was projecting to other people, you could even say the wrong people, and the love I was seeking from others never felt quite deep enough. I do think, it's important to align with the right people because sharing your energy with those who are not on your frequency will drain you of life itself. Since home lives within, I needed to take care of that home first. I had to refill my own cup of love and I had to learn to love my own company. I needed to love myself first. (Side note, I haven't had that melancholy, nostalgic feeling in about 5-6 years. Not sure if this journey was the reason.)

This spiritual journey, which is ongoing opened up a whole new genre for me when it comes to creativity and art. My subjects suddenly had meaning. It became personal. The paintings now have a story and every fibre of my being is in it. So here we are now on this painting that I am showing you here. This was born again with a new name; "Coming Home". I say born again because I started this painting a couple of years ago but for some reason I could not make it work. Probably because at that time, it did not have a story.

Here's progress on it so far. It is not fully done. It was started in September. If you look at my last blog post, you will see that I titled it, "it's okay to start over" and it was the beginning of this new painting. I'm abut 50 hours in so far and probably another 40-50 to go but am excited with where this is going. As you can see it has evolved over the last couple of months. There is a story here and a lot of symbolism and it's all about self love and discovery.

If you stuck around and read this whole thing, kuddos to you! :) I'm not sure if people even read blogs anymore.

Starting sketch:

Current status: WIP

Final: Finished December 2022