Coming into the "Zen Zone" again...

Hey Everyone,

Just wanted to give everyone an update on Ceramic Tattoo Art. I have been very busy this month.. Been getting used to the new job here at the Mt. Helix View Estates in El Cajon Ca. I love my new pottery studio and the Property Management position here. It is truly an artists dream to be able to live and work in the same place and have all your expenses paid for. God has given me a life beyond my wildest dreams once again.. :)

I am truly blessed and feel like I have finally found my "Zen Zone". After being homeless and living in a van for the last year+ this puts a whole new perspective on things. While I was homeless last year I had coffee with a good friend in AA at yes my office - McDonald's.. We were talking about stuff and shooting the shit one morning and he said something profound to me that has been running through my mind now for months. He stated "You just have to find your Zen Zone" and that rang so true to me. The Zen Zone to me right now is having "Balance" in my life and having all of the stuff that I need, you know the right combo to make some good stuff happen. It is so hard or at least has been very hard for me to find the right combo. This time I know I have it. When you know you have it and you know if you keep doing what you are doing and you WILL succeed this time it is such a great, freeing feeling. I have the right combo due to finding this job where I have everything paid for as far as living so that I can create my art urns. This is the "Zen Zone" for me cuz I don't have to have pressure on myself to start the biz and have the biz pay for all of the overhead it takes to start a Ceramics Biz, especially in this economy. Freedom to just be true to my art and to myself and enjoy the process. To remember that life and everything I do is a process and I can't keep anything when I leave this earth. By being homeless last year and loosing literally everything for a period of time it showed me first hand that material things mean really very little. We need them, I happen to need a lot to do my art but it just puts things into a different perspective.

I can enjoy the process by having balance in the things I do. For example what I have been doing lately to have this balance is to focus on taking my time with things and enjoying just simple work and daily tasks and thinking as I do them that I need to set myself up for success and get organized to be able to handle the responsibilities that God is going to give to me. To me having material success is having a lot of responsibility. I have had it before so I know it creates pressure. I have certain skills and abilities that I know will bring me great financial success in the near future if I keep doing things right and keep the "Zen Zone" working for me this way. I feel like the recent life lessons I have been going through have been teaching me in real life to be able to handle a great amount of material success. We will see, either way I am very happy at this time in my life. This is the "Zen Zone Combo" for this addict that seems to be working and will work for me:

1. Get on my knees in the morning and ask to do Gods will for me not mine!

2. Hit an AA Meeting every day.

3. GIVE to someone else. For me California Homeless Resources give me this ability to give 1 hour a day. I just have to make sure I add one City to the list and I can literally do this for the rest of my life adding more States to the List.

4. Keep the priorities that I have set down for myself in order: Sobriety, Family, Business, Art

5. Share myself and my art with the world and just enjoy it.

I will include some pics below of the updated studio. I have all of my equipment except for about $1,800 worth of Home Depot stuff like saws, shelving, etc... My garden is coming along nicely and I am even considering planting a garden in the back. I have been juicing every day so that would be cool. I am now going to be throwing a piece a day. I want to take my time with each piece this time and do it all right. I will be working on these designs on my Custom Urns page of the website.

The living Room/Art Studio