Is it the summer of my discontent, or the fall? Or is it the ability to quickly make a mark? Carving stamps this very satisfying and I highly recommend giving it a try.
You will need Speedball carving blocks, a brayer, a carving tool, paper and ink. That’s just to give you an idea. Blick’s has a great selection.
The stress is almost visible these days, isn’t it? So make sure you take a walk too, as well as something small that is creative. Personally I don’t think that much news is that great for us. The 24 hour news cycle might be what got us into this mess in the first place. They're just selling. Yuval Noah Harari in the book Sapiens which everyone should read talks about how anthropologists think that humans for most of our time on earth have lived in groups of about 150 to 200, all over the globe. So that means our brains developed with the capacity to be able to keep a thread on that many people.
It is definitely important to know who you can trust in your community, and who you can't and where you can go to get things done. But now in the modern day, we're hearing about tragedies and happenings in small towns half a world away minutes after they happen and our bodies don't know the difference from our reaction if it's someone we actually know or it's just reading words on a screen. Our reactions are the same. It’s like humanity has been in a high cortisol stress response since World War One, with constant news about battles in far off places. I'm not saying the answer is to put your head in the sand, but the current method is a disaster.
Anyhow, I use these carved pieces to make things. Cheers.
