Authentic. I've been thinking a lot about that word. One of my favourite definitions carries with it the connotation of having been verified, proven, supported.
For the last several years, I have had the singular privilege of working with an absolutely amazing vocalist, performer, mentor, and friend. At every turn, Lynn has been there to show me the path that leads to a more fulfilling life of creativity. It hasn't been an easy path and I'm sure that there are some who look on the twists and turns and shake their heads, thinking "This time, she's really gone off the deep end." I can't explain why this path is so important to me. Part of it is, quite frankly, because it is who and what I am. I am a musician. I am also a writer, and a photographer.
Recently, my creative path has taken something of an unexpected twist. For the first time in my life, I'm actually considering leaving behind the rock-steady (if frequently stressful) world that I've known for the past several years and venture out into something a lot less stable. I'm becoming increasingly protective of my time and energy. I find myself increasingly resentful of intrusions into my creative time. I want to spend more and more of my waking hours doing things that feed the creative,not drain it. And in the midst of all this, I find myself increasingly anxious to just get going.
So what does this have to do with being proven or supported? Only this. Art needs to be supported, not only by those who appreciate it, but by the people who create it. If my art is to be authentically my art, I have to carve out the time and the energy to let it flourish. And if I can somehow get out of my own way? Well, then the sky's the limit.
Wednesday, August 18, 2010
Wednesday, August 4, 2010
What's In a Name?
A recent question Jennifer Knapp posted on her blog got me to thinking about the ways I define myself. Beyond the usual daughter, friend, conservative, financial analyst, lover, or what have you how do I see myself really? It's an existential question, to be sure, but I've been thinking more in terms of what I want my life to stand for?
I recently spent a week in Santa Fe, letting the rhythm of my own breath plot out the course of my days. It was an exceedingly liberating time where I could tune into my own pulse, listen for God whispering to me on the morning breeze and see if any of the labels I have given myself over my life really fit any more. I know, I know. It sounds like the start of some sort of mid-life crisis, but it really wasn't like that. I had given myself the gift of silence and learned very quickly how valuable a gift it really was.
For most of my life, I've allowed myself to be defined by how other people view me, and for the most part that hasn't been a bad thing. Honestly, who doesn't like to be called friend, confidante, encourager, ally, lover? And I don't think those aren't labels one can really give to oneself, not if they are to be meaningful. The people who have so named me are precious to me. They are part of the tapestry of my life that has given heft and richness and I thank God every day for each and every one of them.
There were the labels that have been given to me by employers and colleagues that always made me sound like I was part Girl Scout and part Labrador Retriever. Not that being thought of as reliable, conscientious, hard-working, or dedicated is a bad thing, but I've never been comfortable with those. As true as they may be, they feel too confining. The expectations that go along with those labels seem to deny what else is true of me: I am not my job.
In the silence of my Santa Fe retreat, I allowed my thoughts to turn to what words I use to describe me. Musician, writer, poet, survivor. I felt proud of myself for identifying with those labels. But there were other words I felt less comfortable with. Co-opted, compromised, complacent. When had that happened? When did I decide that settling was okay? When did I trade my reach for my grasp? Where were the labels I wanted to be true about me? Content, fulfilled, growing, free.
I don't have the answers yet, but I'm working on them. I think that's part of what it means to be human. Not having the answers yet, but seeking them. So for now, I'll add another label that I think I can live with: Seeker.
I recently spent a week in Santa Fe, letting the rhythm of my own breath plot out the course of my days. It was an exceedingly liberating time where I could tune into my own pulse, listen for God whispering to me on the morning breeze and see if any of the labels I have given myself over my life really fit any more. I know, I know. It sounds like the start of some sort of mid-life crisis, but it really wasn't like that. I had given myself the gift of silence and learned very quickly how valuable a gift it really was.
For most of my life, I've allowed myself to be defined by how other people view me, and for the most part that hasn't been a bad thing. Honestly, who doesn't like to be called friend, confidante, encourager, ally, lover? And I don't think those aren't labels one can really give to oneself, not if they are to be meaningful. The people who have so named me are precious to me. They are part of the tapestry of my life that has given heft and richness and I thank God every day for each and every one of them.
There were the labels that have been given to me by employers and colleagues that always made me sound like I was part Girl Scout and part Labrador Retriever. Not that being thought of as reliable, conscientious, hard-working, or dedicated is a bad thing, but I've never been comfortable with those. As true as they may be, they feel too confining. The expectations that go along with those labels seem to deny what else is true of me: I am not my job.
In the silence of my Santa Fe retreat, I allowed my thoughts to turn to what words I use to describe me. Musician, writer, poet, survivor. I felt proud of myself for identifying with those labels. But there were other words I felt less comfortable with. Co-opted, compromised, complacent. When had that happened? When did I decide that settling was okay? When did I trade my reach for my grasp? Where were the labels I wanted to be true about me? Content, fulfilled, growing, free.
I don't have the answers yet, but I'm working on them. I think that's part of what it means to be human. Not having the answers yet, but seeking them. So for now, I'll add another label that I think I can live with: Seeker.
Tuesday, July 27, 2010
Oops, I did it again. . .
"I know that nothing good lives in me, that is, in my sinful nature. For I have the desire to do good, but I cannot carry it out. For what I do is not the good I want to do; no, the evil I do not want to do - this I keep on doing." (Romans 7:18 - 19)
Somehow I don't think Paul was referring to (literally) feeding one's emotional state but it fits nonetheless. Of course, I think it applies equally well to other, self-destructive behaviours. Mine happens to include carbo-loading. Oh, and chocolate. Can't forget the chocolate.
I've had a lot of time to myself the last couple of days, trying to get my head around some existential questions that come to us all at some point in time. When I came up against some answers I didn't like - I ran straight for the chocolate and potato chips. I know better. All the Cadbury's Milk Chocolate and Ruffles in the world isn't going to make me like the answer better. All I'm left with is a really awful feeling in the pit of my stomach that comes from knowing that rather than face the truth, I decided to self-medicate, and that it didn't work. Again.
Someone once told me that we keep running to our idols, knowing they will fail us, knowing they cannot save us, because the alternative is too awful to contemplate. No, this isn't going to be a "God loves us anyway" kind of blog. That sort of thing makes me want to gag. Not because I don't believe it's true: quite the opposite. It's because I can't get my head around a God that big. I can't get my head around a God who loves me so much He won't leave me where I am and He won't let me be content to wallow in the pig sty when He has fine robes waiting for me, and He won't let me settle for a numb, half-life of existence when He created me for so much more. Too often, we reduce the intangible to a greeting card sentiment that does Him a great disservice and minimizes the depths of our own struggle.
My idols are too small. They are too weak. They are too fickle. But I keep fooling myself into believing that this time I'll have the right combination of sacrifices ready, this time I'll say the magic words with enough sincerity that this time my idols will answer me.
In Hosea, God says (speaking metaphorically of Israel): "Therefore, I am now going to allure her, I will lead her into the desert and speak tenderly to her." It reminds me that I demand much more from myself than God does. All He has ever asked of me is to "Be still and know that I am God." (Psalm 46:10). I look for God in the wrong places. I expect God to be huge, and He is, but I forget that He is also very small. A whisper. A tender touch. A breath. A thought. I Kings says that when Elijah was hiding in the caves, the Lord passed him by. There was a mighty wind that brought the mountain down, but that wasn't God. There was an earthquake afterwards, but that wasn't God either. After the wind and the earthquake, a fire roared past, but the fire wasn't God either. But after the fire, a still, small voice. And that was God.
I read a personal account from a musician I admire a great deal, in which she recounts the anxiety, and fear she felt when her daughter was born. She had messed up a lot and she worried that her baby girl was going to pay the consequences for all of her mother's messed up decisions. And when that child was born perfectly healthy, she wrote she heard God whisper:"See? I'm not what you think I am."
What do I think God is? And more to the point, do I think He is stronger than the idols I run to when I don't like who I am?
Somehow I don't think Paul was referring to (literally) feeding one's emotional state but it fits nonetheless. Of course, I think it applies equally well to other, self-destructive behaviours. Mine happens to include carbo-loading. Oh, and chocolate. Can't forget the chocolate.
I've had a lot of time to myself the last couple of days, trying to get my head around some existential questions that come to us all at some point in time. When I came up against some answers I didn't like - I ran straight for the chocolate and potato chips. I know better. All the Cadbury's Milk Chocolate and Ruffles in the world isn't going to make me like the answer better. All I'm left with is a really awful feeling in the pit of my stomach that comes from knowing that rather than face the truth, I decided to self-medicate, and that it didn't work. Again.
Someone once told me that we keep running to our idols, knowing they will fail us, knowing they cannot save us, because the alternative is too awful to contemplate. No, this isn't going to be a "God loves us anyway" kind of blog. That sort of thing makes me want to gag. Not because I don't believe it's true: quite the opposite. It's because I can't get my head around a God that big. I can't get my head around a God who loves me so much He won't leave me where I am and He won't let me be content to wallow in the pig sty when He has fine robes waiting for me, and He won't let me settle for a numb, half-life of existence when He created me for so much more. Too often, we reduce the intangible to a greeting card sentiment that does Him a great disservice and minimizes the depths of our own struggle.
My idols are too small. They are too weak. They are too fickle. But I keep fooling myself into believing that this time I'll have the right combination of sacrifices ready, this time I'll say the magic words with enough sincerity that this time my idols will answer me.
In Hosea, God says (speaking metaphorically of Israel): "Therefore, I am now going to allure her, I will lead her into the desert and speak tenderly to her." It reminds me that I demand much more from myself than God does. All He has ever asked of me is to "Be still and know that I am God." (Psalm 46:10). I look for God in the wrong places. I expect God to be huge, and He is, but I forget that He is also very small. A whisper. A tender touch. A breath. A thought. I Kings says that when Elijah was hiding in the caves, the Lord passed him by. There was a mighty wind that brought the mountain down, but that wasn't God. There was an earthquake afterwards, but that wasn't God either. After the wind and the earthquake, a fire roared past, but the fire wasn't God either. But after the fire, a still, small voice. And that was God.
I read a personal account from a musician I admire a great deal, in which she recounts the anxiety, and fear she felt when her daughter was born. She had messed up a lot and she worried that her baby girl was going to pay the consequences for all of her mother's messed up decisions. And when that child was born perfectly healthy, she wrote she heard God whisper:"See? I'm not what you think I am."
What do I think God is? And more to the point, do I think He is stronger than the idols I run to when I don't like who I am?
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