Antagonist— Protagonist: Can you guess which one is which, in this painting?

If you just arrived here from my social media: A hearty welcome! And thank you for taking the time to explore further.

You are the protagonist: principal character in your life that makes you the hero or heroine of all that’s wonderful. With good directing you can manage your own life’s story. 

You are also the antagonist: the one; less honorable character in your head, that is hell bent— “Picture a devil on your shoulder like in a cartoon holding a pitchfork.” on messing you up. If you surrender to that guy; who wants to tangle your story with twists and turns making every decision complicated and in some cases unfathomable. You will succumb to… “well you finish the sentence.” 

Our lives are like the plot in a movie or a play; like Shakespeare said: “All the world’s a stage, And all the men and women merely players; They have their exits and their entrances.”

As the script writer, producer and director you can manage your own life’s story. You can cast all of characters that come in and out of your life. And if you are like me, make sure you have the very best lighting director, so you can make sure you are always in the best possible light. Oh yeah; a good makeup artist is a must…

Does any of this have anything to do with being creative? Perhaps, maybe, possibly and maybe not. We all over think when we are practicing creativity. I suppose a concert pianist or anyone that plays an instrument goes into a regimental state of concentration, during the long hours of practice. If their mind drifts to negative thoughts the practice is ruined. Other forms of creativity like painting; “the one I’m most involved with.” Has its own set of thoughts wrapped into it. The self questioning,  “is it is,” or “is it ain’t,” any good? Which unfortunately occupies much of your creative painting thoughts.

What about writing? It’s wonderfully creative— or at least it can be. The convivial,

companionable and self communicative efforts that goes into writing especially fiction benefits greatly from; “antagonistic and protagonistic thoughts.

How do you suppose movies are scripted? If they are derived from a novel or from the fertile imagination of the writer’s life experiences, invariably they all have a common theme. You may have guessed it— “antagonist versus protagonist.”

The theme of my painting defines two characters; “abstractly of course.”

One is the ever present; antagonist, we all have them living comfortably in your brain cells. Just like the jerk movie character that we love to hate, we want good to tramp all over evil. We all, or at least most of us want to leave the theater thinking; “ya… that SOB— got what he deserved.” We say in a state of giddiness; “I’m glad he or she (depending on how twisted the movie.) ended up being thrown into the alligator pit, to suffer the slow agonizing demise he deserved.” “What a jerk!” 

Your brain thoughts, my brain thoughts— we sometimes let the antagonist give us a hard time when we’re trying to be creative. No more needed to be said, I know it, you know it. 

On the other hand: everyone loves a hero; protagonist. Unless, maybe you are a gamer, then it can go either way, depending on how many points you have racked up. Every movie plot has a protagonist, or a group of them that contend with evil. Fighting inch by inch to the last scene. With right on their side, they celebrate the triumph; good beats evil every time.

Study the above painting: you will see what appears to be two very abstract characters. The round disc on top of each, represents their minds. Are they male or female? One is the antagonist and the other is the protagonist. Try and see if you can identify who is the hero of the two. 

I am not going to get into the gender of the two characters, but I will tell you who is the more balanced and together of the two. One is on point, well balanced and in control. The other is losing it. The mind is rolling off course. Now you know; it becomes obvious. Our creative thoughts react in a similar way, sometimes were balanced and other times we are rolling off into emotions that betray our goals.

Who is he and who is she? Now I have become the “antagonist” with a little imagination you can easily identify their genders. Leaving me to be the jerk.