“The ground of practice is you or me or whoever we are right now, just as we are. That’s what we come to know with tremendous curiosity and interest.” –Pema Chodron
I closed last week’s newsletter with an expanded version of this quote, a favorite that I come back to again and again. Two sentences, each part ringing like a bell. “The ground of practice…” (the arena, the foundation, the beginning), “is you or me or whoever we are right now…” (we are fluid, unfixed) “just as we are” (we already are everything we need in this moment). “That’s what we come to know” (our task), “with tremendous curiosity and interest” (The open state that is required to do the work).
A first principle of maintaining our practice is to not only have tolerance for where we are but to actually embrace it. Beginning again, learning something new, or simply showing up in the day-to-day requires us to meet the moment with our current selves, as we are, and not get caught up in the idea that “I’ll do it when I… am more this, less that, have this, feel that,” etc.
I’m uncomfortably familiar with this conditional way of thinking. I put off beginning this newsletter for years because I thought I needed to essentially re-invent myself to begin. I thought I needed the perfect website, to generally get my shit together, a kick-ass social media plan, unbreakable confidence and inner calm, so that I could show up and create and write consistently. In other words, I wanted things to be perfect before I began. This is the trap–the idea that sometime in the future we will feel ready, that things will be perfect, that we will be perfect, and we will know when that time arrives. But it never arrives, because we have placed it firmly in the future. We, being temporal creatures, can only ever be in the present moment, so naturally, the future never arrives; the future is always not now.
So it becomes our job to live and act and create in the only time we ever really have. Present tense. Right now. And that, friends, is often messy. So, no surprise really, I’m here to verify that I am indeed imperfect. By the end of this past week of moving house and unboxing and sorting, while fighting a cold and a vague but persistent feeling of disorientation, I was an emotional trainwreck. I feel much better now but had a few Very Rough Days. At 2 am Friday night I stared at the ceiling, feeling profoundly depleted and panicked about my ability to show up here, and write anything of any value to my readers.
And then I remembered: I already have everything I need. Show up in this truth and write what is valuable to me right now, just as I am. Trust that if I feel this way sometimes, so do others. And that the things that heal my mind are a balm for all of our minds. This newsletter is for you, and it’s for me as well; I often write the things that I need to read the most.
So what I want to say to both of us this week is let’s not wait until we’ve gotten over the fear, have things under control, get our shit together, take all of the workshops, and finally feel confident and deserving. Because guess what? The fear cycles back, life is complicated, we’ll always be learning, and we are already worthy. The world does not need our aspirational perfection. We get (and give) enough of that garbage on social media and within the constraints of other areas of our lives. The world needs our whole imperfect selves.
It is not easy, but it really is that simple.
Gleanings are on hiatus this week due to the aforementioned moving boxes, viruses, and personal exhaustion. Instead, leave us all a comment and share a quote, a link, or an idea related to creative practice. What is lighting up your creative practice?
Yours in practice,
Lisa
PS—if you like what you read here, share it with a friend and be sure to give a little love by hitting the heart button below! Thanks!
Its not inspiring, but this is what has been supporting my practice this week:
https://www.carpalrx.com/post/hand-exercises-for-artists
The best exercises I've found for wrist strain, along with an explanation of what the exercises are actually doing and why they're helpful.
Love that you’re transparent and open to sharing your creative vulnerability so that we too, your readers, can find ourselves in that often messy stew of emotions and self-doubt, and begin to embrace the inherent reality of it and grow with and through it to a place each of us can thrive. Thank you!