For those of us who have been seriously blocked at times–and man, I have been there and can still be there–sometimes the hardest thing to do is to just DO the work ANYWAY (see the first two years of this blog). I can tell you that when I was blocked I was NOT short on ideas, inspiration, or plans, what I was short on was patience, humility, and action. I loved the IDEA of creating in a concrete way, but for the longest time I was not willing to be bad or a beginner again. I was in love with my own history as an artist–the times I was flowing with work or living what I perceived looking back as an idyllic time. I combed over my songs, my poems, my art that I had completed like precious, frozen love affairs that I could not leave behind. The truth was I just needed to sit down and DO. What this required was willing to feel like a complete loser, to be boring, to be really BAD, and to live with the shame and pain of leaving behind my perfect, frozen past, and admit to where I really was–as imperfect and unromantic as it was.
From Tough Love by Summer Pierre
Archive for November 2008
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