so here I am at the beginning of a new chapter – and I have got to say it is the first time at the beginning of a new chapter where I have the literal feeling of not knowing what is to come next, or what the future looks like. Yes – I have done new things before – moved cities, jobs, girlfriends even, creative projects…and yes it is new and in a sense unknown but even then there has been a feeling of some kind of knowing or ground.

It is something that sounds like ‘this is me yes and here I am doing my next thing’.

THis time there is no ground, there is no complete picture – there is a very strong ‘no-thing’.

Joe Dispenza says that when you have a sense of being no-one and nowhere and with no-thing, then more is possible. I can confidently say I have no illusion of having any of these in a state of ‘knowingness’.

I am currently house-sitting, so moving around and taking care of other people’s homes and animals. It is a momentary stepping into someone’s world as if it is my own. I place a couple of items out to give me the sense of my place. I at once move as they do through their home, their routine – I am dwelling momentarily in the home life they have made until I make my own.

I am working for a children’s theatre company and we have created The Little Yellow Digger – a show about a digger. and a bigger digger and a bigger bigger digger…adventures with whales and elephants and hippos and school pipes bursting…worlds within worlds. The theatre world is a bubble – intense playing with ideas, rehearsing, breaks timed to perfection – I have had the feeling you get when in a very intense circumstance – being with someone in hospital – all life revolves around this one thing and the world outside is passing you by.

I get to play music – I have played music all my life – is this all I am? A question I ask constantly. Is that enough? what variations come with it – the theatre world has given me a new perspective for sure and oddly in the ‘stress’ of moving and being in a state of impermanence. I have had a surge of interest in writing and creating musical environment. Maybe this really is my way of processing my world. or my fall back
position when I’m unsure – time will tell. But I have enjoyed every bit.

Given how precarious everything is (I don’t know where I’ll be living or how I’ll be earning in 3 weeks time) I have been. for the most part. oddly calm.

You see. simultaneously alongside the fact that I am at the most unknown moment of my life. I am also most aware that I get to make it up from here.

This is what creating is really about – whether it’s the song. the journal entry. the new secret rugby set piece. or the life…it all simultaneously combines the position of the unknown (the wide. white page to quote Bill Manhire) with the purpose of intent and subsequent action.

Make a brush-stroke. click submit. talk to that person.

Time is moving incredibly slowly for me at the moment. They say that the more the brain is engaged in new activity – or that routine is interrupted. the more time slows down. As we get settled into routines time starts to rush by as we aren’t noticing and categorising newness and surprise.

No one needs to dramatically uproot their whole lives as they know it – I wish I hadn’t had to in such dramatic fashion but now I am here and learning that it need not be so scary and that whatever I choose to build from here could always do with a bit of variety and freshness.

And that brings me back to my practice of songwriting and composing for that is what ‘making’ gives us the chance to do – alter the world around us a little.

So I will circle around it – the life and death of it – the possibility of it. In this state  every interaction. every scene change is significant.

I will chronicle it here – as any intrepid traveller does their journeying.

Here’s to you and your making whatever that is.

#creativeprocess
#thelifewegettomake
#whenthethingsthathealyouhurtyouandthethingsthathurtyouhealyou