What would you do if you knew that you could not fail?
- Elizabeth Barrett Browning
Yesterday I broke my own writing rule and failed to get even one page finished. It was a migraine day and I don’t accomplish much of anything on those days. I have had debilitating headaches since childhood and they continue to knock me for a loop about once a month. With medication, they last one day instead of three. Doctors initially thought it was my eyesight. After I got glasses in the seventh grade, they said it was stress. Stress in the seventh grade? I don’t know what I had to be so stressed about. Not sure why I’d be too stressed these days either. Since quitting the waitressing job, I have yet to line up anything else. I tell myself it’s so I can focus on the writing. A pretty questionable motive but I can at least make good use of the time.
The place I stopped writing was a painful one or rather, it was just beginning to get painful. Perhaps that is where the migraine came in. I don’t tend to worry about things consciously; I worry in my body – headaches, stomachaches, that sort of thing. I’ve learned to listen carefully to these clues to know when something might be bugging me but has yet to surface. As always, I can’t avoid these things, especially if I want to finish this book and I intend to finish.
These words, from the great American dancer Martha Graham, continue to inspire me when I falter.
There is a vitality, a life force, a quickening that is translated through you into action, and because there is only one of you in all time, that expression is unique.
And if you block it, it will never exist through any other means and be lost. The world will not have it. It is not your business to determine how good it is, nor how valuable it is, nor how it compares with other expressions. It is your business to keep it yours clearly and directly, to keep the channel open.
You do not even have to believe in yourself or your work. You have to keep open and aware directly to the urges that motivate YOU. Keep the channel open. No artist is pleased. There is no satisfaction whatever at any time. There is only a queer, divine dissatisfaction, a blessed unrest that keeps us marching and makes us more alive.