Watery applause
filters through my window;
an atmospheric
stream of consciousness,
rafting my mind
to memories thought lost,
of friends, of love,
of pain, of loss.
Flushing rivulets
clear out the old
to make space for
sunnier days ahead.
Heavy rains make for sodden cycling
Rain drops in such profusion that ripples annihilate ripples
The tiniest of movements,
Almost imperceptible,
At the corner of her mouth
Told me all I needed.
She had heard me.
Her eyes resolute,
Focused keenly
On the wall ahead;
Tremulous in fear lest
She give herself away.
Pulse quickened.
Breathing changed.
Hands once relaxed
Now firmly planted
To still nervous thighs.
And so I repeat,
“I love you”
(Image used without permission mostly just to keep you guessing.)
How do you say goodbye to a dream? How do you deal with the fact that you can only start a dream but have no control over how it ends?
Dreams don’t ever end the way you expect them to. My first clue should have been dreams of the sleep variety.
So often, for the ones I can remember on waking, my dreams start remarkably well for me; I am achieving something, accomplishing something, learning something highly desirable to me. But just as often—whether positive dream or nightmare—the dream veers off the course that I would have consciously or rationally chosen for it, and I find I am not as in control of the dream as I had hoped. When the dream ends or when I awake, I find I am in a different place than I expected to be.
So it goes, I am learning, with wakeful dreams; those moments of aspiration and decision where you consciously set yourself on a path to something different.
I have spent my life dreaming of a different existence, and in the last year or so, I have been very active in making those dreams my new realities. As time passes, however, I am coming to realize that I have only so much power to steer my dream once I have initiated it. It is like climbing into a barrel and rolling into the river above Niagara Falls.
The current will do what the current will do. The rapids will buffet me as they choose. Gravity is the great roaring sound in the distance.
But as much as I talk about passively floating downstream and letting the universe decide, there is still a part of me—the human part, no doubt—that feels if I just press my shoulder this way or press my heels out that way, I can right the barrel so my head is high or somehow adjust the forces acting on the barrel such that I remain suspended above the gorge when I hit the precipice. But I am wrong.
I cannot say with certainty that upon hitting the precipice, I will plummet into the waiting whirlpools and eddies at the base of the falls. However unlikely, according to my friend Isaac Newton, I might fall sideways. The river could reverse its course at the last second. I could wedge behind a rock and simply be buffeted in place. Or I could wake up and find myself in bed.
I chose to set the wheels in motion, but that’s all I did, and to a greater or lesser extent, that’s all I can do.
The next few months will be very telling for the directions my recently initiated dreams will take me. I may awake to find they were ephemeral. They may continue into idyllic fields. They may turn into nightmares. It is not up to me.
If a dream must end, it will end. And if it ends badly, then I shall be sad and maybe a little angry. The onus is then on me to start another one. It is all I can do.
Seven words
The lifespan of a conversation never had
Pain unrecognized invalidated
Anger unexpressed unbearable
Disappointment ingrained unappeased
Sadness unutterable unrelenting
Despair intolerable unfathomable
Acceptance impossible unreachable
Hope unthinkable unrealistic
I am sorry that I hurt you
Seven words
Reflections on things we cannot control
(Respectively, photos taken in Toronto; Hope, BC; New York City; China Beach, BC; Chilliwack, BC; Volcan Arenal, Costa Rica; and Montezuma, Costa Rica)
Previous post was obviously a false alarm…my apologies to all.
After several days of rain, freezing rain and a touch of hail, I thought it would be nice to remind Torontonians and people in a like weather scenario what Spring and Summer look like.
Took a walk earlier today with my camera, trying to shake the creative cobwebs. Got home just as the rains began, and feeling a whole lot better about things.
In Part One, I discussed the idea that the only difference between creatives and non-creatives or people who are blocked is a psyche filter that has become clogged; a filter that sits between thoughts generated deep within and expression of those thoughts to the outside world.
Below, I offer some thoughts on what I have found effective in unclogging that filter.
Step over it or go around it. Nowhere is it written that you must solve this problem right now. Depending on the nature of the project in which you find yourself stuck, is there an opportunity to simply mark a placeholder for where you’re stuck and move to the next part? Personally, in any creative endeavour, forward momentum is key and once lost is hard to regain. It’s easier to push a car that is already rolling than to get one rolling. A number of my manuscripts contain notes to myself along the lines of [something exciting happens here].
Likewise, for a written work, don’t feel like you have to solve all of the plot details early on. I had one screenplay that required my protagonist be in disguise. I had no idea how to do this logically, but proceeded as though it would come to me later…and it did. If you’re in a good space, the spirits will guide you and you will find your answers. But you have to be open to those answers.
Walk away. For most of us, these are very personal projects the only deadlines for which we hold internally. So, screw the deadline. Walk away from the project for a bit. Go see a movie. Read a book. Listen to music. Go for a run.
The longer you focus on the problem, the more inflamed it becomes until it becomes a creative cancer. Let it rest. Give the rest of your brain something to do. Let it do the heavy lifting for a bit. You may just find that the rest of the brain has ideas your creative centre wasn’t able to deal with and those ideas may just sneak past the filter (so have a notebook in your pocket, just in case).
Move to another project. I think a mistake a lot of new writers make is only having one project, as that blows the importance of the project way out of proportion. At any given moment, I have at least a dozen different creative projects on the go, at various levels of completion. That way, the minute I see the first signs of boredom or frustration with a project, I can move to another one to maintain my personal forward momentum. Perhaps the one thing that clogs a filter quickest is creative fallowness as lack of movement breeds insecurity.
The nice thing about working on multiple projects is that the creative act on one project often stimulates the creative response on another. You may have your answer to project one; you may not just be able to see it until you work on project two. Which leads me to…
Try another creative activity. Creativity breeds creativity. For me, photography stimulates writing (I suspect it works the other way, too). When I’m taking pictures, I am focused on the task at hand, the object on the other side of my lens, but because I am a storyteller, part of my brain is applying context to that image. You may have seen examples of this in some of my other blog posts. It allows me to visually tap into other emotions and contexts not previously obvious in my mind and those may inform my writing dilemma.
The key is to actively engage your brain. If you want to do something more passive like reading a book, as suggested earlier, try reading it aloud. Forcing yourself to actually engage with the written material will stimulate different parts of your brain, including your auditory centres. Responding to the movie screen, however, will likely get you thrown out of the theatre.
Hang with other creatives. First off, I don’t think there is anything inherently wrong with a pity party. It can be good to commiserate and share war stories from the trenches. It helps us to understand that we are not alone and that there is another side to the current blockage. And who better to help you with that than fellow members of the society.
Likewise, simply sharing your dilemma opens the floor to multiple brains with filters at various stages of clogging. Hopefully, around the table, there is enough creative force to blow the walls of those filter pores and clear things out. Yes, it’s your project, but you don’t have to do it alone.
If you think screaming at the gods will help break your writer’s block, give it a go! (Photo taken in Hope, BC, ironically enough)
It may sound ridiculous to say, but wherever and whenever I travel, I find symbols of my inner journey, the personal transit that extends beyond airline tickets, overstuffed luggage, and souvenir shops. And it’s often not until I arrive home to look at the images within my camera, that I see the patterns.
Am I imprinting meaning where none inherently exists? Does it matter?
Whether inherent or imposed, the imagining of a pattern changes me and the pattern becomes true.
The following are a selection of images from my travels last year through British Columbia, a break before I began on the next great journey of my life, and one I take alone.
She stands in the yard,
the centre of her universe,
an observer of her time and place.
Barren arms reach into the air,
fingers scratching at the sky,
grasping at the breeze.
She stands alone.
Her skin is deep ebon,
in stark contrast to the piles
of snow at her feet.
Once, it was smooth
but now bears the deep
crenellations and scars
of her many years.
The pliancy and suppleness of youth
have been replaced with the
inflexibility and roughness of maturity.
Her age has brought many visions,
scenes of an over-full life
flooding her existence.
She has seen the passing
of innumerable families
in her neighbourhood;
The birth of children
who have played in her yard,
enjoying the welcome
of her open arms.
Children who develop
and change their surroundings,
having children of their own,
growing old and passing on.
Yet, she outlives them all.
She will live forever.
For her, the years are minutes,
decades but hours.
Who knew, those many years ago,
when that small grey squirrel
prepared his forage for winter,
that such beauty would surface
from the cold, damp earth
pressing down upon her infant self;
to shade her yard in summer;
to return fertility in the Fall with humus
from her dead and dying leaves.
She is the immortal,
timeless and carefree.
(One of the autumn immortals from Toronto’s High Park.)
PIECES OF ME...
Mother, Nehiyaw, Metis, & Itisahwâkan - career communicator. This is my collection of opinions, stories, and the occasional rise to, or fall from, challenge. In other words, it's my party, I can fun if I want to. Artwork by aaronpaquette.net
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