Why we create

It's a little tougher to face the blank page this morning, because I have something on my mind.

Sometimes we end up with a chunk of reality blocking the path to the creative world. That makes it tough to write, tough to draw or paint, tough to compose. It makes it tough to face the challenges of a new day sometimes. 

These are the days, though, when it's even more important that we manage to push through. These are the days when we rely on the habits we've developed, instead of the muse we're always seeking. Because these are the days when creativity has to become automatic and robotic, while our brains are preoccupied with news we've heard, with the niggling little worries of our lives.  

There will be days when it doesn't pay to push yourself to do the work. Whatever it is you create, there will be days when there really is something more important happening. But on days like today, when there's just the press of reality squeezing the tubes a little, narrowing the veins through which your creativity flows, you have to decide to do the aerobic exercise of creating anyway.  

You'll be out of breath. You'll feel your muscles burn. You'll feel like stopping short of the miles you would usually run. But you push through that and keep putting one creative foot in front of the other until, suddenly, you cross the marker. You're there. You've done it. And getting to it helped shake the feeling of weakness and helplessness and resentment that had been building. 

Sometimes we create so that we can go on creating. Sometimes we create so that we can say to the world, "I hear you. I see what you're doing. I feel the weight of it. And I care. But this is important. This matters. And this will be done." 

I don't know what sort of challenges you might be facing today, but I do know you can do it. You're the strong one. You're the fast one. You're the smart and clever one. And I adore you for that. Go create, because it saves you. And share what you create, because it saves everyone else.