Creating Lent (What is the Work of Your Hands?)
Lent: The penitential season where we move (with great intention) from our gorged, swollen, addicted state to something more Divine. At least, that’s the hope. But is Lent all about fasting and prayers and saying holy things on the internet to garner attention?
Dear God, I hope not.
We are created in the image of a Creator, at least the ancient books says so. If this is true, and if Lent is a journey to connecting with the grace of our originally created state, shouldn’t Lent include some act of creation? Yes, I say.
Years ago, I wrote a novel. It was a beast of a thing (quite literally), entitled Bears in the Yard (you can read it in serial installments by joining here). It’s the story of a man who is making his pilgrimage to end, the great beyond, the far shore, whatever. It’s a recasting of his life—the joyful, the regrettable, the sexual, the sensual, the mournful. When I finished that novel, I let it sit. And sit. And sit. It sat while the earth made eight cycles around the sun, and this Lent, I’ve dusted it off. My goal? To complete the editorial process and get it to a literary agent by Easter.
40 days to polish a novel. Let’s go.
I create because I was made to create. So were you. Your mode of creation is different than mine, of course. You work wood, tie flies, knit stocking caps. You paint, sketch, stitch together haiku. Maybe you make those country checkerboards with roosters painted on the edges. Whatever your chosen mode, that act of creation is an act of becoming more Divine. It is a sort of liturgy, an act of prayer.
Today, set a creation goal as a Lenten practice. You have 40 days to make something new, something unique to you. What will it be? If you’re so inclined, let me know by shooting me an email.
Writing as the Art of Connection
Why write? Why create? Artist, authors, and actors have given hundreds of words to the topic, but last week, I laid hands on a copy of Jeff Tweedy’s new book, How to Write One Song. In it, he writes,
“At the core of any creative act is an impulse to make manifest our powerful desire to connect—with others, with ourselves, with the sacred, with God? We all want to feel less alone, and I believe that a song being sung is one of the clearest views we ever have to witness how humans reach out for warmth with our art.”
Truer words I’ve not read on the process of writing. This is why I’ve written and published two books and am working my way through a redraft of a novel. It’s why I pen a regular newsletter and why I marry prose with photography.
Every effort of writing is an effort toward creating connection, whether with a friend, yourself, or the Divine. In that way, every effort of writing is an effort toward formation—of relationship, community, or Divine communion.
I’ll share more about the act of creation as connection with the Divine tomorrow, but in the meantime, tell me: Is there some method or mode of art, some creative effort you use to connect with others, yourself, and God? Drop me an email and let me know.
DON’T GO JUST YET
If there’s one regret I have about The Book of Waking Up, it’s that I didn’t realize just how addicted we are to politics at the time of its writing. I suppose I understood it at a macro level, but this election cycle has exposed a much deeper addiction. If you haven’t picked up a copy, please do, and consider just how the framework of waking up applies to our political addictions.
My Creativity is Broken. Is Yours?
I’ve broken from my own conventions. After writing and publishing every day for several months, after building an entire routine around the practice, I found myself in a pandemic rut. COVID came and with it a by-God dry spell set in.
This is not to say I didn’t write. I pecked out words here and there, words about the pandemic and the election and what it means to be sober in it all. I shared both depth and pith on Instagram, Twitter, and in Newsletters. But that marvelous streak of daily writing died. I held no funerals. I said no eulogies.
I’m clawing back some attempt to come back to the page more with more regularity, particularly in light of the fact that the election is—cross your fingers and hope-to-God—over. In the first spate of writing, I hope to explore why creating (something, anything) is important in this age of burn-it-down insanity. I hope you’ll join me. I hope you’ll invite others to join. More than anything, I hope you’ll set your mind to creating regularly.
Expect to see new pieces on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. In this week’s series, I’ll explore the power of creativity, particularly in an age of deconstruction. I hope you’ll join me.
DON’T GO JUST YET
If there’s one regret I have about The Book of Waking Up, it’s that I didn’t realize just how addicted we are to politics at the time of its writing. I suppose I understood it at a macro level, but this election cycle has exposed a much deeper addiction. If you haven’t picked up a copy, please do, and consider just how the framework of waking up applies to our political addictions. Then, chart a course for true political sobriety.
I Might be Insane, But I'm Inviting You Along for the Ride
I’m writing this update from my office, and one story below me, a concrete saw and jackhammer offer alternating distractions. One moment screeches. The next quakes. I am not living my best writing life. It is par for the course of 2020.
Writing has been difficult in this insane milieu. But it’s not just writing. Just about everything takes more effort in 2020 than in previous years--eating healthfully, exercising, spiritual disciplines, fighting smartphone addiction. If this year were to be tagged with an adjective, it’d be disruptive.
Many of my routines--particularly around creative disciplines--have fallen by the wayside this year, but I’m determined to rediscover them. It’s creativity that makes us human, after all, and I’m feeling less human by the day. Today, I’m inviting you to keep me accountable to creativity. How?
Eight years ago, I wrote a novel, Bears in the Yard. I scrawled it three-quarters drunk during an impossible time, a time I felt my own life might be unraveling. It was an exploration of something, though I couldn’t say what at the time (drunk as I was). But as I’ve considered the story over the years, and I’ve come to see it for what it is. It’s a story about what it means to live a good and weathering life.
The story follows Wesley, a World War II veteran who’s confined to a hospice bed. He examines the scope of his life, the ways he’s been deconstructed and reformed, all while wrestling with anthropomorphic dream images of bears and mountain goats and geese (oh my). It’s a southern gothic story with a trace of magical realism. Still, it is unfinished, and I’d like to finish it.
I’d like you to follow along as I revised and complete this novel. If you follow this link to my Substack page and become a paying subscriber, you’ll begin receiving excerpts every week or two. You’ll also have access to an archive where you can catch up on the story in its entirety if you miss an installment. And yes, it’ll set you back a few bucks a month, but the buy-in will keep you honest (I hope), and it’ll keep me motivated (I assure you). And if this goes well, I hope to begin working on a second novel next year, one which will borrow from Bears in some small way, though with a sort of futurist twist.
Please signup to follow along and I’ll send the first installment TONIGHT. Also, consider sharing this with a friend or two, asking them to follow along (just change the email address).
Finally, I’d love to hear from you. What are you doing to stay creative in this season of insanity?