There has been considerable feedback from readers on the topic of “hiding” from my last post, and the fear of doing things that scare us off, make us feel vulnerable and question ourselves. So I’m going to keep diving into these questions and try to offer some wisdom I’ve gleaned in the last while, drawn from words of other creatives. They riff on and around this subject. A couple of them landed powerfully:
“Whatever you’re meant to do, do it now. The conditions are always impossible.” (Doris Lessing, author)
“…always go a little further into the water than you’re capable of being in, go a little bit out of your depth and when you don’t feel that your feet are quite touching the bottom, you’re just about in the right place to do something exciting.” (David Bowie, musician and actor)
Both of these speak to the ability, nay!, the NEED to persist despite the fear, despite the haters, despite the denying voices inside our heads that scream: FRAUD! These voices lie. They are trying to protect us from humiliation, but seriously, friends. They are not helpful. We have to dispel them. Again and again. I chose the image of this tree pushing its way up out of the rock because it speaks so clearly of the ability to surmount impossible circumstances and carry on. The ability to find nourishment in the most unlikely and seemingly inhospitable of places.
Speaking to precisely this point, I’m pulled over and over to a passage from Keith Warner’s Director’s Notes on the play “The Art of War” (currently playing at the Stratford Festival. Highly recommend. 5 stars): “Artists walk the front lines of grief, transformation and resilience. It’s no small task. They face fear, burnout, poverty and self-doubt. They question their purpose, their impact, their voice. And still, artists show up because art is how we make sense of what we value as human beings.”
The road is long. The path is arduous. There will be pain and suffering, but also great joy. We must persist. We must. Persist. Keep questing, my friends. The world needs our voices.