I've often had pause to reflect that perhaps I was bequeathed too many gifts, too many things I'm able to do, or put my hands to. My creative interests have ranged wide. That has always been half the difficulty. The other half, a certain fickleness to my self confidence. Were I to name just a few past endeavours, there has been painting, poetry, acting, singing, performance art, story writing, history, morris dancing. Literally impossible to pursue all of them, all of the time. Creative impulses spread too thinly, might as well be a ghost. Which in itself proves dissatisfying.
Then there is the restlessness that never sleeps. A lifetime of endeavouring to find outlets to be creative within, kept company with the insufficiency of sleep. Fertile soil left fallow for too long can be painful to consciously recollect. Of all the crops never sown, so never reaped. Perhaps it is in the night that I dream the dreams I either do not want, or perhaps fear, to imagine or remember. Tossing and turning over what was or could have been. I needed to earn a living, quite often in an entirely mundane way. Entailing some of my desires being martyred on the altar of necessity. This is not an experience unique to me, it is regrettably quite a common one.
I work these days on encouraging gratefulness, for what I do have, what I have done, what I am doing creatively. This helps, to a degree. Saving me from falling too deeply into the pit of melancholy for anyone to reach and pull me out. I fully appreciate the value of the creative things that I have been able to do. But part of me remains unconvinced by my own arguements. On an emotional level I'm always hungry for more. Whatever I have done, falls short of some idealised potential. It can be like living with this quiet but persistently unrequited love. That hangs around in the wings saying ' you go right ahead and try to make this impasse seem perfectly alright. You know that it isn't. But I'll still be here patiently waiting for you to come up and embrace me. Just let me know when you're ready'
I clocked it was never going to be feasible to keep all my creative plates spinning, quite early on. It helped to focus on one artistic endeavour at a time, if only to get the sense of having made progress. I am fortunate to be blessed with many practical skills, picked up over the years. Though I've not had either the desire or the depth of talent to develop these to the level of true craftsmanship. Its too late now anyway. The dexterity and suppleness of my arthritic hands grows stiffer and more prone to cackhandedess. Finely detailed fiddly work not far from being beyond my ability to execute. I have to cultivate contentment with what it is that I can do, however imperfect. For this will have to do.
I'm not confident artistic creativity alone can ever be a reliable enough refuge. To invest huge amounts of faith in, spiritually speaking. It is far too needy of attention. So rife is it with discontent and the voracious craving for more. Art can be like an addictive beast, the more you feed it the bigger it grows, the more insatiable its appetite becomes. Yet it appears, I cannot let it alone, something remains needing to be given a voice.
Art as a form of self expression, it could be said, has no practical purpose, no meaning other than in the doing of it. Zen Buddhism might say that the whole idea of artistic self expression is a form of deluded neurotic vanity. And whilst I am fully aware of its evident limitations as part of a spiritual path, I appear unwilling to kick the habit. Unless the habit kicks me first.
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