Day 360 and I'm only 5 days away from finishing my 2010 blog.
Doubt I'll attempt a daily blog in 2011. I'll keep it going .....but watch for something more and something new coming in social networking.
Writing.
It's interesting that in the digital age the most popular website is a site that sells books - Amazon.
Social networking might be pushing us to short grammatically flawed sentences for our texting or Twitter pages - but real books with real English and real sentences aren't about to go out of fashion.
Recently I came across an good article on writing in the ODE Magazine. It highlighted three rules for writing as a spiritual practice:
1. Don't write what you know.
2. You can't write what you don't know.
3. You must write.
Over this past year I've come to appreciate these three frustrating yet inspiring rules, and come to appreciate that like meditation and prayer no one can do it for you.
This is what makes writing such a spiritual practise.
So, my blog writing this past year was actually more for my soul than anybody else's. Difficult to tell whether the frustrating times did more for my soul than the inspiring times.
I'll keep writing in 2011.
My soul needs it.
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Inspired by this blog post and the article in ODE magazine. So as a New Year’s resolution, I’ve decided to write. Ok, I always write emails, etc. but this is an attempt to write more frequently, more profoundly, more imperfectly, just more. I’m going to take to heart a journal given to me by a good friend and just write. Maybe I’ll respond more to things like blog posts too. Maybe I’ll write more scripts for film projects. When I look at writing as a spiritual practice, it’s very freeing, I feel more uninhibited. When I think of it like prayer, it takes on a simpler authentic form. Like a child sharing an imperfect drawing to a parent with the sun purple and the grass orange the parent beams. Childlike we lift up our heart to God in prayer and place Him on the throne. God appreciates our gift, our sharing, our surrender, our asking, our vulnerability, our love. Writing exposes. Writing pushes. Writing is like any other art where you face a blank canvas, an empty dance floor, a camera record button not yet pushed….a blank page waiting for music notes or words to tell a story.
My problem is that I’m a perfectionist. I have to get things just right. I don’t take risks. Well, that’s not completely true, I take calculated risks. But to be an artist, which is my threadbare sweater to don of choice, maybe one can rely on the unsuspecting penetrating words of Dilbert columnist, Scott Adams, “Creativity is allowing yourself to make mistakes. Art is knowing which ones to keep.” So also part of my new year’s resolutions is to make mistakes. Yep, make mistakes, and be ok with that. I make plenty, don’t get me wrong, but to grow one has to engage in conflict and new surroundings, which often means getting out of your comfort zone. I’m not talking anything irresponsible, and I’m told I better not make any mistakes on Sundays, but the rest of the days of the week, I’m getting enchilada sauce on the ceiling. I had a friend who once made enchilada’s for a party at my house. Somehow she got enchilada sauce all over the counters, walls… Her friends told her Mom what a mess she made, but her Mom replied, “When it’s on the ceiling, that’s when you know it’s good sauce!” I’m just talking being human and putting vibrant energy into being a Christ follower, showing passion and compassion, and maybe making a little mess and getting dirty along the way. How can I live out grace and appreciate grace if I don’t recognize and embrace my need for it. Writing is a great way to take risks, to expose, to stretch, to grow, to provoke, to stir the soul and share grace.
Gilbert, thanks for sharing this particular Scottish musing…
Inspired by this blog post and the article in ODE magazine. So as a New Year’s resolution, I’ve decided to write. Ok, I always write emails, etc. but this is an attempt to write more frequently, more profoundly, more imperfectly, just more. I’m going to take to heart a journal given to me by a good friend and just write. Maybe I’ll respond more to things like blog posts too. Maybe I’ll write more scripts for film projects. When I look at writing as a spiritual practice, it’s very freeing, I feel more uninhibited. When I think of it like prayer, it takes on a simpler authentic form. Like a child sharing an imperfect drawing to a parent with the sun purple and the grass orange the parent beams. Childlike we lift up our heart to God in prayer and place Him on the throne. God appreciates our gift, our sharing, our surrender, our asking, our vulnerability, our love. Writing exposes. Writing pushes. Writing is like any other art where you face a blank canvas, an empty dance floor, a camera record button not yet pushed….a blank page waiting for music notes or words to tell a story.
My problem is that I’m a perfectionist. I have to get things just right. I don’t take risks. Well, that’s not completely true, I take calculated risks. But to be an artist, which is my threadbare sweater to don of choice, maybe one can rely on the unsuspecting penetrating words of Dilbert columnist, Scott Adams, “Creativity is allowing yourself to make mistakes. Art is knowing which ones to keep.” So also part of my new year’s resolutions is to make mistakes. Yep, make mistakes, and be ok with that. I make plenty, don’t get me wrong, but to grow one has to engage in conflict and new surroundings, which often means getting out of your comfort zone. I’m not talking anything irresponsible, and I’m told I better not make any mistakes on Sundays, but the rest of the days of the week, I’m getting enchilada sauce on the ceiling. I had a friend who once made enchilada’s for a party at my house. Somehow she got enchilada sauce all over the counters, walls… Her friends told her Mom what a mess she made, but her Mom replied, “When it’s on the ceiling, that’s when you know it’s good sauce!” I’m just talking being human and putting vibrant energy into being a Christ follower, showing passion and compassion, and maybe making a little mess and getting dirty along the way. How can I live out grace and appreciate grace if I don’t recognize and embrace my need for it. Writing is a great way to take risks, to expose, to stretch, to grow, to provoke, to stir the soul and share grace.
Gilbert, thanks for sharing this particular Scottish musing…
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