Week 4: No words for you

So the big activity or challenge for Week 4 of the Artist's Way is Reading Deprivation. The premise is that as blocked artists we consume other people's creations as a way to avoid our own thoughts or the scary prospect of creating something (that might fail) ourselves. So the task is to spend a week NOT reading and see what happens. Julia isn't too specific about what forms of media are to be avoided. She casually mentions avoiding magazines and newspapers and TV, but the book was written before blogs and email and social networks became such distractions. So I threw those in, too. Also, she several times suggests that you might listen to music when you aren't reading. But as a musician, I recognize that I often listen to other people's music instead of creating my own. So I decided to have musical deprivation, too.

In some ways, this was an incredibly easy week to do this task. Since I had just moved into a new apartment, there was a lot to do so I didn't have a lot of downtime to read anyway. Plus, I didn't have internet set up in the new place so that meant I had very limited access to blogs, twitter, and TV since I only watch Hulu and Netflix. So it was easy in that it didn't take much self-discipline to avoid reading. Self-discipline is hard for me. But there were several times when I'd been unpacking for hours and I sat down on the couch and reached for the latest New Yorker. No. Get up. Go tackle one more box. Go for a walk. Do something else. And by golly, I got that whole apartment unpacked. And I got myself packed up for Nashville.

That's the other thing that happened in Week 4. I packed up my car full of stuff (Not too much, though. I purged, remember?) and drove part-way to my new part-time home. And there were other people in the car and there was a wedding and a family trip to the mountains over the weekend, too. So not much time to squeeze in reading or TV even if I had wanted to. I was way too busy hiking and dancing and toasting hearing about my friends' love lives and travel adventures and job woes. I didn't have a second to miss reading at all.

Music was harder. I listened to silence in the car when I was running errands and several days while I was unpacking. But I did put on some old CDs while I  was emptying boxes. And I put on a record when a friend came over for dinner. And of course, there was lots of music at the wedding. But I think my true break-down came on Sunday afternoon when Alison and I had pretty much spent 48 straight hours together, had discussed everything we could think of, had been driving for 6 hours and NEEDED the radio on. Still, the stations faded in and out as the road winded around the mountains, so we had to talk anyway. And it didn't distract us from seeing a bald eagle swooping over the farmlands of western Virginia, so I think it was OK.

The first chance I really had to go back to consuming media was Tuesday when I had a 10 hour drive to Nashville. I probably would have gone crazy trying to drive 10 hours by myself in silence, so I was really glad I had some audiobooks and music and phone calls (on the headset!) to keep my brain alive. But I also spent some time with nothing playing, because I really see the value of being quiet with my thoughts. And when I got here and spent a day "working" with my 12 different windows open, flipping around between playing videos and checking email and Facebook and music listings, I felt like a total scatterbrain. I want to go back to that place of focus I had last week. So maybe a little bit of reading deprivation every day is in order. If you all would just stop creating such interesting things for me to read and watch and listen to, it would be a lot easier!

Am I A Late Bloomer?

I know it's been a while since I've blogged. I just didn't have any great ideas to write about, and I don't want to subject you to reading something boring like "I had a great show, I drove a hundred miles, I got up early and went running." (Oops, I just did. But with irony!) So then I thought I could come up with something interesting to say about my constant procrastination. But I think I just might have covered that topic before. I know I think about it almost every day.

Then yesterday I read Malcolm Gladwell's recent article in the New Yorker. Hear him talk about it here. It's all about "Late Bloomers," or artists who come into their genius later in life, and it raises some pretty interesting issues for the way we structure our creative lives, and how artists interact with the marketplace. Drawing heavily from the book "Old Masters and Young Geniuses" by David Galenson (which is now on my reading list), he describes an alternative to the artistic archetype of the Prodigy or inherently talented youngster which many of us have come to believe is the true genius. The Late Bloomer is more of an experimental artist, taking years to practice, research, try different techniques, hone her skills and ultimately find her voice. Late Bloomers produce works of art every bit as intriguing and important as Prodigies, but much later in life. Cezanne and Ben Fountain are the examples he chooses to illustrate this point.

Inspiring, right? Maybe we all have potential to be great artists when we retire! Maybe we shouldn't write off arts education for our kids just because they don't seem to be talented by 5th grade.

The problem is that these days, we expect that good art will be supported by the marketplace. Lots of people who dream of being a singer or painter give themselves 5 or 10 years to "make it," then move on to a 8-5 job. And who can blame them? It's hard to be poor for years and years, especially if you have no guarantee that your art will ever be well received. Especially if you are a perfectionist who is rarely satisfied with your creative output. And is it really an option to have a full time job and practice art on the side? Will there be enough time to follow every thread of inspiration, repeat every exercise enough times to make it just right? Gladwell suggests that many Late Bloomers are blessed with Patrons, be they parents or spouses who pay the bills so that the artist can work. But those are very special circumstances indeed, and certainly open to abuse. The common call lately seems to be "Cut those free-loading 20-somethings off!"

I you haven't guessed yet, I feel like a Late Bloomer. My self-critical side wonders if I'm just glomming on to the idea to justify my minimal success, and make myself feel better about getting older. How do I know that I will actually ever "bloom" someday? But I relate to the characterization on more fundamental points, too. I can be quite a perfectionist, feeling very unsatisfied with my songs and editing or re-writing them over and over. But I also really enjoy the creative process, the research part, winding down different alleyways of ideas, gathering resources and inspiration around me. Some days the observing and noticing and learning is more satisfying than having a finished song to sing. Take Galenson's quiz to see which you are.

Having realized this, what do I do? Look for a patron? Re-adjust my expectations? Push myself harder or back off? Am I OK with waiting for my success? Is my family? Is the youth-obsessed music industry? I hope this article sparks more discussion about different types and timelines for creative expression, we sure need some kind of a change.

So maybe I'm not really procrastinating. I'm just researching....