I’ve realised something in the last few years...
That there is a real, un-tapped power in ‘making things’ - be it art (in the strictest sense of the word,) or some other by-product of imagination and/ or skill.
Take writing, for example.
It's not an obvious art form, I’ll admit, but it’s a branch of creativity in which there’s much catharsis, clarity, learning and even confidence to be gained, given half a chance.
As someone who’s attempted to build a career (as well as better health) out of the art of spilling digital ink, people often ask… 'but don't you ever run out of things to write about?’
Contrary to the finitude of 'health & lifestyle' sub-categories, however, this hasn't actually happened...yet. After all, even when there’s nothing to write about… you can always write about writing, right?
Yes, if there's one thing I've learned about navigating the blogosphere successfully, it's that the subject and relevance of what's penned... isn’t quite so important as upholding the discipline.
One of the best ways of explaining this, or so I’ve found, is through a quote by Eat, Pray, Love Author Elizabeth Gilbert. It said:
‘Possessing a creative mind is like having a Border Collie for a pet. If you don’t give it a job to do, it will find a job to do… and you might not like the job it invents.’
Writing, for me, is that job.
The challenge and satisfaction of cherry-picking words that weave together to best informative and/or emotive effect… it’s the stuff of ‘Writer's Highs.' In other words, those cerebral high fives that abound when re-reading your best works, and which one copywriter who I follow recently likened to a kind of prideful, 'I made that'....tingle!
Of course, there are other means of ‘making’ stuff that aren’t quite so.... wordy!
Making cakes
Making flower arrangements
Making plans
I’d maybe even go so far as to say making a coffee, for this process (done properly) has as much potential for ‘ambedo’ as the next taken-for-granted triviality.
Ambedo, by the way, is the word used to describe that feeling of being inordinately absorbed in sensory details - which resets and recharges the introvert mind.
I only learnt it recently (from Author Peter Mosley) and now I can’t stop thinking about it, and how it has finally given a name to the once-ineffable face of my 'Writing mode'…
To sum up, and to fully appreciate the ‘power’ of making ‘making’ part of the everyday framework…it helps maybe to look at the opposite approach, and of what might happen when art and all it stands for (ie. growth, learning and creativity) grinds to a conscious, life-stagnating halt.
Through the lens of this alternative scenario, the effort of penning a random rambling on #writerslife seem like a small price to pay, for keeping the gnawing jaws of an over-active mind at bay, if nothing else.
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