Since I took the easy way out by posting the pictures of the kids, I figured today I would write a rather uninspired but timely post about Tucker leaving for Drill today and the niggling [possibly] irrational fear I’m feeling since it’s been snowing.
And since my heart and head wasn’t really in it, I scooted over to Twitter see what everyone was talking about and to kill some time between then and the inevitable time of me making myself write something I didn’t really want to write.
In the span of maybe five minutes, three of the people I follow tweeted something about Eat, Pray, Love author Elizabeth Gilbert and a couple tweeted a link to the New York Time’s book review of her most recent book, Committed.
I’ve never read Gilbert. In fact, I had never heard of her.
I recognized the book cover art for Eat, Pray, Love but I had no clue what the book was about – apparently it’s been a huge success for Gilbert. I ended up on Gilbert’s website [since I was still delaying the whole “Let’s write about ‘What ifs?’ like Tucker ending up in a ditch due to icy roads”] and there at the very, very bottom of her site is this embedded video for this website I had never heard of and the image that’s been picked for the front of the video is just so joyous and inviting that I had to watch the video [my decision had nothing to do with procrastination].
And because I’m super awesome, I’ve embedded the same video here since it’s something I think every “creative” person should read.
As I was watching the very beginning of the video, I started to realize a lot of what the video is about is fear.
Fear of not being able to find that creative spark again, fear of failure, fear of going crazy or becoming a drunk, fear of the creative process as a whole and I realized this was a damn timely time to be watching this video.
My entire post was going to be about fear – fear of the unknown, of the imagined, of the worst case scenario – but there was just something about Gilbert’s video that struck me dumb.
Any person who has created something at one point or another in their life knows what Gilbert is talking about. I don’t care if you painted an amazing painting, cooked a rockin’ dinner or composed a damn symphony, you always worry about your next project and about falling flat on your face.
Gilbert’s description of the creative process is spot on – sometimes it just takes you and you have to get it all down and if you don’t then you’ll lose it and I’ve had that.
The Note came from one of those times.
I wrote and wrote and wrote and it really was like a daemon was spoonfeeding my hand all of those words because my brain sure wasn’t part of any of it. Whatever was out there had something to say and all I was there for was to write it down.
I read it.
Reread it and quite literally patted myself on the back. That story was one of the few times where I wasn’t concerned if something was “good” because it was/is good. The problem for my little brain was what would come next.
What’s funny to me is that I haven’t changed the title of this…I just changed the meaning.
What if you don’t worry so much? What if you go with the flow and accept that all you can do is what you’re doing and maybe if you’re not actually trying your hardest then you start?
Regardless of what you do or don’t do, watch Gilbert’s speech – it’s informative, interesting and it’s almost your lunch hour anyway.
Image/Flickr
