I can't paint, but let me decide

I watched a re-run of Star Portraits tonight - it was the first one with Michael Parkinson. I remember a little bit of it from last time, but not enough to think that The New Adventures of Old Christine would be better viewing.

One of the artists said something that really struck a chord with me. I've mentioned it before, but this summed it up very nicely. She said (I'm paraphrasing here) that painting is similar to cricket. The ball comes at the batsman very fast, and it is only reflexes that enables them to hit it. They must rely on body language to pick up cues on how and when the ball will be bowled. And this is like her when she is painting. She just starts, and the painting is a process, and it just comes to her somehow. Both are examples of how you can teach technique, but this does not make you a batsman, or an artist.

So true. So why does this strike a chord with me? There are things that I do, know, and mostly decide, that cannot be explained by rules. I seem to have a knack of summing up complex environments in a relatively short time and making correct judgements about them. I know how decisions should be made. Heck, I've even taught decision making as a process skill. But there are intricacies that cannot be easily constructed within a linear decision making framework. There are factors in systemic frameworks where multiple objectives interact with multiple alternatives and link with multiple outcomes. Stop rambling M, you lost them at Parkinson.

I thought I was wrong once but I was mistaken.