I AM Not Required to Explain

When Life Gives you Lemons, May 2025

Just out of curiosity, I tried how AI would write a blog post about the sense of freedom one feels when one is not bound by others' judgements. Interestingly, AI wrote a crisp, clear, smartly written blog. However ultimately, I don't want a machine to express my thoughts, so I will not use that because surely, no one else could explain me or my thoughts better than I can. But maybe, the more appropriate concept is this - I do not need to explain myself at all! I am here to be exactly according to my own preference. I am here to express the way I want to express, to create exactly as I am meant to, and if all of that does not make sense to others or is not accepted by others, then so be it.

For the painting this month, it's quite simple: I watched a Korean drama called When Life Gives You Tangerines, and the title seems to unknowingly have stuck to me while doodling on my canvass. Et voila, a painting called When Life Gives you Lemons! There is no deep meaning I guess, just an acceptance of what flows through my consciousness in my creative moments these last few months. In context though, I will say it came out during a time I was deciding a serious life transition, of going back to the US from Europe at a very unusual political time. This life move is in response to a personal need to be closer to family, to the people who I did not need to explain anything to, even when I can be as sour as a lemon sometimes.

In the past few days, I had a coincidental or maybe AI driven algorithm that led me to creators that asked: What will you create if nobody was watching? Apparently, based on this painting, I will create a messy garden with a cat, butterflies, birds and lots of flowers. How boomer of me as my niece would often say about my art, which always makes me chuckle. So here we go, here is my messy boomer garden. It made me happy just to have the time to paint. For me, the resulting painting reminds me that maybe the uncertainties (or lemons) that I encounter in life are not as bad as I might initially think. And maybe the mess I think it is, is not as messy as I imagine it in my head.

With this, I leave my final learnings on this: Create as if no one was watching! Dance and sing as if you were alone in your room. Do not edit your own heart and creativity. You are not required to explain yourself, you are only required to be: yourself.

Wishing you all the best my friends and the most delicious lemonade of a life!