As an entertainer, I have always had a great love for the arts and my professional life reflects that as well. But painting was the farthest thought in my head. I did, however, secretly admire painters from afar. I would study their paintings and read their back stories. I would feel a strong sense of connection when I read about how they lived their lives and their philosophies and dreams.
So that familiar feeling, that tug at my gut came around again and hit me real hard on Tuesday Sept. 11, 2001 (9/11). I had felt it before but never really confronted it or allowed it to well up in my soul, as it did that day.
We often think to ourselves, Oh yeah, I’ll investigate that emotion and see what comes of it, but for now I’m just too busy to do anything about it. So, I put it off yet another time. Those burning embers deep in my na‘au, trying to surface once again, were pushed down and lay dormant.
We are funny us human beings. We are always looking for a sign it seems … something that will tell us what to do with our lives. Pursuing our own dreams means we have to alter our present course, walk the path less traveled and risk failure and embarrassment.
I believe that signs are being showed to us all the time! Some are laid out in front of us and yet we still don’t see them. These extraordinary higher vibrations that we all have felt in our lifetimes wait for us to acknowledge their splitsecond appearance in our lives.
I’m talking about passion!
And so, in your life, if that passion came knocking at your door today, what would you do? Well, I can tell you what I did. I finally answered the door.
I can tell you that all the fears that accompanied the passion were realized. It was hard making that abrupt turn. Oh, but the gifts it brings, the feeling of soaring high above the Ko‘olau. A freedom and separation from a physical reality that turns into spirituality! Now it is a higher reality, now it is the divine. Faith, hope, love and passion!
Finally, I said to myself, I’m going to paint today. I’m going to listen to that nudge, that rumbling in my gut and see how far I can take it.
From that moment forward, my life would change in a very profound way.
Since September 11, 2001, I have painted every day.
This is what I would like to impart to you … a little bit of my mana‘o: You, too, can seize the moment! Make the move to pursue that secret you’ve been pushing down and hiding for so long. The time is now … grip your shauts! I guess what I am saying here is, It’s never too late to find that passion!
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