The other day (last Saturday in
fact, 21 September), on a flight from Toronto to Saskatoon, I found myself
thinking about my last blog entry, “Restlessness.” I had been thrown off my
game last week because restlessness had tackled me the way the ball carrier in
a game of rugby is brought to the ground. I felt hopeless. I was caught
somewhere between the mountain and the valley, stuck. Immobile. Since then
something has shifted, thankfully, and I’m inching my way back up the mountain.
I’ve got my groove back.
Last week I finished the rewrite
of a novel. The process was, at times, long and daunting. Some chapters held up
really well while others required a complete, from the top, overhaul. I’m not
naïve. While this rewrite is done, I know the manuscript still needs some work.
So, for the moment, I will let the manuscript rest before tackling it again.
But I finished something. And
that felt good. Often I find myself moving about from one project to the next,
and it’s that back and forth between projects that I know can break my focus — particularly when I’m
in the middle of a challenging rewrite. I try to tell myself, “Worry about the
short story or essay later. Finish what you’ve started.” But there’s something novel about starting a new piece, or
going back to another that has been tucked away in a drawer collecting dust.
Witnessing a novel or a series of
paintings or a musical composition come full circle gives perspective. A
completed project offers reassurance, when doubt lingers large and heavy, that
I am in fact on the right path. I’m reminded that I have heeded the call of
what it is I feel compelled to do in life. It reinforces — in the face of
rejection and the resulting doubt about my talent that may manifest — the artist in me. The finished novel or series of
paintings or musical composition says, loud and clear, “I’m an artist, hear me
roar!”
Finishing something says — whether I’m restless or
surviving a long period of drought —
that I’ve showed up at the page, the easel, or the piano, and that I’ve dared
to be faithful to who I am. I’ve succeeded at navigating through whatever
hurdles that stood before me.
Finishing something proves that I
am resilient, and that I have taken to heart what Goethe told us: “Whatever you
think you can do or believe you can do, begin in. Action has magic, grace and
power in it.”
Keep at it! I know you will navigate the waters successfully.
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