Roisin Markham

For 10 months I’ve been doodling daily.

“every morning a sense of reflection

of trying to understand where I am

what I am making

what I am committed to

and why why it matters”

Carrie Mae Weems

I’d some basic rules first thing in the morning A5 notebook, black ink, quiet space, no input from external sources and a cuppa.

My daily doodle started as a way to connect to myself for 10 minutes every morning before work, social media, breakfast or most of the house was awake. I’d get up go downstairs, let the dogs out, have a stretch. Still trying to imitate Coco’s perfect downward dog. Some mornings I’d grab a glass of water others a hot cuppa. The front room is my default working space, it’s where I work remotely from and was previously my art studio.

Most days but not everyday I post the doodle to my instagram account, I consistently use the same hashtags and they are saved in a reel called saorlíníocht which as a direct translation in Irish is free- line. The actual Irish word for doodle is still unknown to me. If you know it please share it in the comments, I’d also love to know what doddle is in other peoples native tongue, go’wan leave it in the comments.

So I now have a growing collection of A5 notebooks with hand drawn doodles that are developing into something. What, I don’t know & I’m unattached to the outcome (that’s a miracle by the way).

Part of my doodle practice is mediative, a mindfulness literally my mind maybe full before I begin and I empty my mind, letting go and letting come. So the practice maybe more mind-emptying then mindful!

To put pen to paper every morning. Not knowing, to just show up. It sounds simple and mostly it is. But I’ve been fascinated to watch how I unfold with this practice, making rules up and consciously becoming aware of them. Observing them – why does my brain think that pattern or shape always needs to look like that, why does this not look visually right? Asking the why of it. Tending to and breaking imagined constraints. After all it’s my 10 minutes, it’s my page, it’s my line and mark making. Also weird I make up rules, it’s a doodle!

Mostly I have to be satisfied with the doodle. The time can and has stretch from 10 minutes to 40, I’ve had to make allowances for that. Some mornings I’m content with a light touch

Other morning the complexity of different weights of black lines extend my flow

That’s one of the critical things of this simple practice it allows me to be in flow. Doodling makes flow accessible, more familiar to me.

My daily ritual a simple commitment to 10 minutes with some black pens and a blank page allows me a mediative state. In the weeks where I’ve not been able to meditate, where my anxiety has been running high this practice has been a daily anchor point.

I notice my line and drawing has developed, a graphic style of sorts is emerging. 2015 I was forced to learn to write from scratch again, a severed bone tore that skill away. My finite drawing vanished instantly. The line still wobbles, but now I appreciate it as character, as me, as who I am slipping out onto the page. The doodles are not that deep. I draw mostly from an unconscious place. But I see depth and enjoy it showing it’s face.

Colour sometimes demands its space and in the last month my travel watercolour paints have been found and used after years.

This is one of my favourite colour doodles more about Pica makers leaking and playing with it then a planned oh I want it to look like this. It was a bright sunshine morning so I took my doodling outside

I now recognise motifs and get curious with them. My practice is less rigid and playful.

I have to actively own the joy and playfulness.

Some motifs start as chevrons, triangles the dots and circles transform overtime. That’s the point of drawing every day it needs time, space and freedom.

I amuse myself that my doodles maybe linked back to Newgrange and celtic spirals, patterns that I saw as a child on dolmens and stones. As a teen I learned and studied them in art history. It’s all input, it gets put in the mill of my brain. Who knows how everything I consume gets mashed up, processed and expressed.

Well, I do know to some degree because I’ve 10 months of evidence.

There have been times where I’ve really let my wild imagination flow, hello! Not my childhood wild imagination but my adult full blown weirdness. That’s been intriguing.

My inner critic is now a full blown character that I have conversations with. That’s also partly to do with the work of Steve Chapman, Dancing with my inner critic. If you’ve not seen his Ted talk Dancing with my inner critic, check it out.

There is an idea floating in my brain to take my doodles to larger paper and make a drawing. It feels like a thing that comes with a price tag I may not want to pay. I’m resisting the commodification of my practice. I’m resisting the idea of it as something to perfect, to make a product of, to sell.

Right now it’s just my commitment to myself daily to practice, to be imperfect, a doodle. It’s play. It’s purpose is personal expression.

Part of this 10 month journey has been about reclaiming my headspace, my creative expression, my wobbly line, my relationship with my wild vivid childhood imagination and carving space just for me. Other things have bumped into that space; decolonisation, people and planet, climate change, mental health, consumerism, a comedy gig, Cornwall, the gym, grief & loss, anxiety large & thumping, love and friendship, quiet, trees, nurturing space, growing food badly, blackberries & therapy.

Life is enriching.

I acknowledge and appreciate my privilege of place, birth, education and opportunity. It didn’t always feel like privilege but I’ve come to respect and appreciate it as that.

Even as I write I’m battling with the narrative of purposeful work and that westernised ideal of us needing work rather then a natural state of being. Of being in harmony with self, with nature.

In January I wrote a business plan for a doodling product and community. I’ve sat on it. Hell I got Chat GPT to challenge and edit some of my thinking and ideas. But to what end? To what purpose… Mental health? Wellbeing? Maybe but right there let’s start with mine.