Are Limiting Beliefs Sabotaging Your Relationships?

Our personal beliefs play a huge role in how we view ourselves, and the world around us — though our beliefs are not reality itself, but rather our thoughts about reality. In our quest for love, many…

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The Visitor

by: Paul Gertner

It was the middle of the second week of March while I was working late into the night when I heard a knock on my studio door. When I opened the door there was a man standing there, a black fedora, slender build, a bit taller than me and he wore a serious but solemn expression. He nodded his head, maintained eye contact and said in businesslike voice: “Good evening sir.” As he took off his hat his eyes quickly darted around the studio through the doorway taking in the cluttered space filled with half finished paintings and completed works hanging on the walls.

“I’m here to pick up the canvases,” he said.

“You’re here to do what?” I said partly annoyed at this late night interruption, and partly amused at his obvious mistake in knocking on the wrong door so late at night.

“Your canvases sir… I’m here to take your canvases.”

“You’re here to take my canvases?”

He seemed puzzled at my surprise: “That’s correct, I need to take them now… all of them.”

“And can you tell me what this is all about?”

“I’m afraid I cannot.”

Going along with the joke I inquired: “Then can you tell me, who are you?”

“That’s not important.”

“And why are you taking my canvases?”

“Again… not important.”

“Why mine?”

“Not just yours… I’m taking everyone’s… everywhere… all over the world.”

“You must be a busy man.”

He rolled his eyes and stepped from the center of the doorway as two men dressed all in black came through the door and began to methodically move through my studio taking every blank canvas in sight. Virgin rolls of canvas still sealed in plastic, canvas stretched on pine frames, scraps of blank canvas scattered on the floor and inside the waste basket, canvases covered in white gesso waiting for an initial inspiration and the first stroke of a brush. He took half finished paintings of subjects and ideas long forgotten that I fully intended to “get back to someday” and finally they picked up and carried out the painting I was hoping to finish that evening still wet with strokes of burnt sienna that I had applied less than forty-five minutes ago.

In anger I pointed to some of my finished works of art hanging on the walls. “You missed a few.” I said in a sarcastic tone trying to control my rage.

“Oh… you can keep those… we only take the ones you have yet to start and the ones you have yet to complete.”

Then he turned to me and said: “I’ll check back in three weeks to see how you’re doing.”

“How I’m doing?” I mocked.

He paused looked me in the eye. There was a change, a sorrowful look in his eyes, and for a moment I thought he was going to apologize. Then he said:

“You are an artist… right?”

“Yes.” I answered.

“We’ll see.” He put on his hat and with a nod of his head he turned and was gone.

The next three weeks were a blur… I was angry at the situation, angry at the fact that it was happening to me, and angry at my inability to stop it. And yes I watched a lot of news … it was happening all over the world. I was not the only one. And then my anger changed to fear. With nothing to paint on there was nothing to sell. With nothing to sell there was nothing to buy… and nothing to buy that nothing with. Within an instant my world had changed. And everywhere I looked fear and uncertainty created a collective communal wake-up call that the world as I knew it had just changed. Not a small change but a seismic shift, a shift I could feel beneath my feet.

I thought of his last question: “You are an artist… right?”

We’ll see.

Three weeks to the minute, April 1st, there was a knock on the door. When I opened it, he nodded his head, removed his hat and said: “I thought I might find you here.”

“Where else would I be?” I countered.

“Well you haven’t given up yet… that’s a good sign,” he replied as he looked around the studio.

I nodded toward the two suitcases in his hands and asked, “My small canvases… you’re giving them back?”

“Oh no… that won’t happen for quite some time… I brought you something else. May I come in?”

“The last time I let you in you took everything I was working on. I’ve created nothing in the past three weeks…. I’m an artist and now I have nothing to paint on.”

“I’m sorry … may I…?”

He stepped inside and placed the two cases on the floor. He flipped one on its side, snapped open the latches and lifted the lid. Inside were foreign objects the likes of which I had never seen — unusual shaped devices and mechanical looking objects with wires and switches that created more confusion than clarity.

“What are these?” I asked.

“Tools… new tools.”

“Tools?”

“Yes…like your brushes and palette knives… tools!”

“And how do you suggest I use them?”

“That’s something you have to figure out.”

“Can you tell me what they do?”

“No… but there are people that can.”

With that he turned his attention to the other smaller case, carefully set it on its side and slowly unlatched the brass hasps and reverently opened it. It was hard to look inside… a glowing intensity, like an aura being released from a confinement of a space that was too small to hold it. It seemed to explode in a glow of light.

“What in the world are these?” I asked.

“Ahhh… you have not seen these before have you?”

“No… what are they?”

“These are new colors.”

I looked into the case and saw vibrant shades and tones that I had no words to describe. They were not the likes of any color that existed in nature. For years I had played with finding every subtle shade between blue and green to properly depict the color of the ocean or the perfect combination of orange, red and purple that would capture the sunset over Boston harbor, but now I was looking at a whole new palette … a range of colors that appeared to keep changing before my eyes.

I caught my breath, snapped the case shut, turned to him and said, “And why are you showing me these?”

“I’m not showing you them… I’m leaving them with you. These belong to you now.”

“But you took my canvases… so what am I to paint with your amazing new colors?”

“I guess… you’ll have to figure that out.”

And with that he turned and left.

Three months passed and I wondered if I would ever see him again. Three months of long days and sleepless nights, forgotten meals and long sessions working late into the night. Three months of watching hundreds of videos and websites and corresponding with strangers who would soon become friends. Three months without leaving my home or studio for weeks on end. Three months of Amazon deliveries dropping off bags of food or another strange tool to add to the mix. Three months in total isolation… three months… a long time.

It was the beginning of July, when I heard the knock… and at first I was half tempted to ignore it. But my curiosity got the best of me, and when I opened the door, there he was… same coat, same hat. However, this time his expression was different. I could almost sense a slight smile. He nodded and said “Good evening.”

I invited him in and he surveyed the studio filled with new tools and unrecognizable shapes and objects connected together with a patch work of wires and devices whose names contained more numbers than letters.

“You’ve been busy I see,” he said as he picked up one of the tools that came out of the first case he had opened three months ago.

“That’s one of my favorites,” I said, “It’s amazing what it can do.”

“A little different from your brushes… eh?”

“Oh no, no… I still use my brushes…”

He held his hand up as if to stop me… and tell me there was no need to explain.

“I saw one of your new pieces on the internet,” he said. “The sunset was stunning. People are raving about it.”

“I used one of the new colors.”

“I thought so.”

“So how are you doing?” he asked.

“I’m doing OK,” I said, “I think I’ll be OK.”

“I won’t be seeing you again.”

“You’re not going to bring back my canvases are you?”

“That’s not up to me.”

“I understand.”

He picked up his hat and walked out the door.

We’ll see.

Are Limiting Beliefs Sabotaging Your Relationships?

The Visitor

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