Daily Nourishment for December 5, 2024: What If It’s All a Huge Waste of Time?
Daily Nourishment Read Time: 40 seconds
Pause/Prompt/Practice Time: 15 minutes
Pause.
Do a few rounds of Box Breathing:
Inhale for a count of four, hold for a count or four, exhale for a count of four, hold for a count of four.
Prompt.
Do you ever wonder if your writing or other creative endeavors are all a huge waste of time?
It’s not. Trust me. I have seen (and experienced!) what happens when people don’t honor their creativity.
That book you’ve been stealing time to write in the spaces between your day job and family responsibilities and all of the other roles you fulfill day after day will probably not be a breakout bestseller, but the creative work you’re doing still matters.
It’s true. Your art matters. All of it matters. The creative process. The art we make that no one knows about. The art we make that a few people know about. How making art transforms us. The lessons we learn when we don’t make the art we need to make.
Practice.
Take notes on why your creative practice sometimes feels like a waste of time, why it’s not, and how you move through to the other side of those feelings if/when they arise.
Also: What happens when you go too long without making the art you need and want to make?
Want to make it Advent?
Which Advent lessons and themes can you apply to this idea of your creativity mattering? Maybe explore the ideas of waiting, darkness, waiting in darkness…
Want More?
Here’s a prayer for believing in your art when no one else does from Black Liturgies by Cole Arthur Riley:
"God of the artist, Is this worth anything at all? To believe in my art feels impossible when my work has been rejected, dismissed, used, and discarded for so long. My ability to view the work for what it is, is fading. Can I be trusted to judge? Can anyone? Assure me in my calling as an artist, that I would not turn away from myself out of insecurity or hopelessness. Grant me a sacred arrogance. Train me to marvel at my artistry with the same gravity that a stranger would. Help me to take myself seriously again—not that I would avoid the difficult task of honing my craft but that I would believe in my art enough to ask a deeper truth of it. And when belief wanes, remind me that I am enough on my own—and when the art isn’t worthy, I still am. Amen.”
Cole Arthur Riley, Black Liturgies
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Today’s Daily Nourishment was provided by Charlotte Donlon.
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