SOON, issue 20: Continuing to Discover the World Even as It Burns Around You
A litany of (free & low-cost) ways to persist as an artist when the state of the world is stealing your energy to create.
Welcome to Something Out of Nothing, a newsletter about meaning—making it, finding it, offering it. I talk about the writing life, teaching, thrifting, books, travel, obsessions and idle interests, and much more.
There’s a lot grinding us down. We all know it. Personally, I’ve been living in a self-induced fog, scrolling, watching, watching more, not much reading, not doing much at all that feeds, rather depletes. Staying up too late, in avoidance—my eyes unfocused and drooping, and I keep fighting it, and then I realize: Your body is telling you what it needs. And I turn out the light and sleep.
I’m coming out of the fog. I joined a gym (ugh). I’ve been reading and eating more fruits and vegetables and I’m passing out by 9:30 most nights. I tell my mother, my husband, some friends, and myself: “We have to take care of ourselves. Especially right now. Because we have to be strong enough to get through this.”
If you’re an artist or writer, and you’re anything like me, then you’re alternately taking shelter in your work or feeling too flattened to even approach it. One of the things I keep reminding myself is that I don’t have to be literally writing in order to be writing—so much of the creative practice is about making time to cultivate curiosity for the world regardless of its dailiness. I’ve put together a list of small, slow experiences that will cost you almost nothing, and gently encourage you to lower your expectations for yourself while continuing to show up for your creative practice.
Soft ideas for wonderment, newness, introspection, and rest
Become a “close reader” of the music you love, or used to love in days gone past. Lay down on the floor. Let the melody, the lyrics, the swells evoke story within you. Follow the storytelling. Repeat what you hear aloud. How do the slanted rhymes or elongated vowels feel on your tongue? If there are no lyrics, let the sensory experience create a story within you. How long do you go on feeling the chills up your spine?
Or choose an album you’ve never heard before but someone in your life appreciates it. Listen to it during your commute, lunch break, while folding laundry. Let those actions be the background while your attention stays with the music. Afterward, what do you feel about your friend or parent or younger sibling? Is the way you know them just a little different now that you’ve given time to understanding a thing they love?
Or listen to this album I’ve picked for you:
Make slight shifts in rote routines. If you commute, try leaving fifteen minutes early and take a meandering route. Make arrival an eventual thing, but not the entire point. Drive, bike, walk, take a different route. What newness in landscape and scenery are you avoiding when you prioritize the efficiency of your commute? What further perception of your surroundings are you possibly circumventing?
Host a book swap with friends. Assess your bookshelves, ask yourself which books you’ll probably never read (or reread), and consider how those books might be met eagerly by someone else. Instead of a traditional book club, try a rotating gathering where people bring some books they’re ready to pass on, plus catch up and be in-person together as busy folks who usually exist through the buffer of texting or social media.
Look at coffee table books in bed, or make it an early morning thing. Let your time be slow and your gaze admiring, open. This is about beauty and wonderment. Don’t worry if you’re not retaining the material. Think of wonderment as exercise for your mind. The point is the action itself.
Each week, make time to watch a documentary. A friend of mine calls this “Documentary Sundays.” Watch a documentary about a thing you love—like, The Booksellers, about indie bookstores and rare book collecting—or, a career you don’t want but wonder about—like, Obit, a behind-the-scenes look at obituary writers for The New York Times, or The Parking Lot Movie, about an eclectic crew of attendants working at a busy paid parking lot in Virginia.
Or, instead, settle under the pure gaze of nature documentaries. Watch Herzog’s Encounters at the End of the World. An extreme escape without the travel logistics.
Or choose a classic movie you’ve never seen. (Credit to my youngest stepson. He’s done a bit of this.) The Godfather. Vertigo. Cabaret. Harold & Maude.
Or pay $5 per month to support PBS and explore so much public television goodness, both live and streaming, and feel good about where your money is going.
Choose one poem and reread it every day. For a week. For a month. Read it aloud. Does the language begin to strike differently? Can you feel a difference in the words between yesterday and today? What resonance starts to emerge through the repetition? Have you created the meaning or was it always there and only now discovered? Write small notes to yourself, if you want, as interpretation begins to change.
Commune with poets at Richmond’s annual Poetry Fest, happening *this* Friday, April 11 and Saturday, April 12. All events free! Schedule is here.
Read a magazine you’ve never heard of before. Recently, I thrilled to the arrival of Mildew, a secondhand fashion magazine that I learned about here on Substack. Articles about decaying family photos, mending clothes beautifully (not perfectly), visiting the Unclaimed Baggage store in Alabama—my thrifting heart is compelled and enamored!
Sometimes, listen to absolutely nothing. Give yourself the gift of silence. At the end of the workday, too often I find myself searching for a podcast just to have something going, or playing music as a background to daydreams, and my thoughts alongside these sensory distractions are often truncated or abstract. What rest is my mind capable of if given the opportunity of twenty minutes of silence?
But if you do want to listen to something, try something left-field. Explore the recording archive from the Key West Literary Seminar, which offers decades of live author conversations from the annual event. There’s everyone from Jamaica Kincaid to Colm Tóibín to Mary Higgins Clark to Tennessee Williams.
Lean into audiobooks. Download the Libby app and check out audiobooks from your local library. Or, try a Libro.fm membership—they split their profits with a local bookstore of your choice, plus you can listen to your purchases on any device at any time. I was concerned I wouldn’t be able to maintain focus, but Libro.fm offers audio samples, so I was able to choose books with the conversational tone I was hoping for.
What are your soft ideas for experiencing the world? I love recommendations for random or highly particular art and media across mediums. What compels you? What book or show or podcast are you right in the middle of? What song or album is on repeat? What is the last painting or lyric or line that echoed within you? What is the last heartfelt infatuation you had with something beautiful or challenging or confusing in this world? Sending ease and daydreams. Remember to rest. Remember to eat whole foods occasionally and stretch and let the action be the point.
*Richmond folks*: Looking for summer writing classes? I have several coming up at the Visual Arts Center of Richmond, with varying levels of obligation. I’m most excited about working through The Artist’s Way by Julia Cameron—for the first time! An evening class that’ll hop-scotch across most of the summer, we’ll be setting & pursuing goals, exploring the guidance of several authors (not just Julia Cameron), communing and writing and attempting new ways of showing up for each other in creative practice.
Whatever you’re able, if you’re able...
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Are you reading Friday or Saturday?