In 2020, Less is Much More

I’ve been reading the Artist’s Way. I’ve known for a long time it’s the book that gave us Morning Pages, the daily routine of waking up and writing three full length pages of long hand.

I’m a huge self-help/self-improvement book and podcast junkie. I’m not sure, but I think I’ve read all of Brene Brown’s books, up until her more recent leadership ones. Elizabeth Gilbert, Cheryl Strayed, and then a whole slew of books disguised as business books, but really, they are also self-help books. It’s my favorite free way for me to learn about all these ideas, to refine what I do and how I think.

Self-care, vulnerability, and authenticity are so trendy these days, and even though my Instagram feed can be bombarded with scripty-fonted text images telling me to love myself, I do appreciate the sentiment. Half the time, I don’t know what that even means. The other half of the time, I don’t have time time or the money to carry out what I think that means. Wouldn’t I love to go get my nails done every week? Or even a massage on a monthly basis. What young self-employed, half-artist has the money or time to take care of herself?? This one doesn’t. Seemingly.

While these are definitely ways of self-caring, I know putting my feet in someone else’s foot bath isn’t the only way. The Artist’s Way is teaching me that. Written in 1992, it talks about all of these ideas trending today: vulnerability, self-care, authenticity, pursuing a creative life. It’s so wonderful that a book has been out there like this for so long, but also scary that almost three decades later, all of these things are such a hard notion for people to incorporate into their lives. It’s costing us greatly.

So I’ve been asking myself what free self-care means. (It has to be free. It cannot tell me to do more, make more.) And what I keep hearing is “Slow down. Spend time in solitude.”

Sigh.

I could now write a novel, a personal memoir, about over-working, hustling, beating myself to death emotionally, physically, and mentally all for the sake of creativity, for freedom, for passion. I’d love to write that book one day. For now, I sit in as much silence as I can, asking myself to embrace this life that is mine, for exactly what it is, while everyone around me tells me it should be different. Even people who “love me.” I truly believe that in 2020, if I can find more solitude, I will start to heal, and I won’t struggle to fit into this world that doesn’t make much room for artists to fit into it.

Quiet. Stillness. Solitude.

This, in a strange way, also means less reading, less listening, to all the helpful podcasts and books that have gotten me this far. They’ve taught me enough. It’s time for action- to create, to move my body, to cook great and life-giving food, to connect and engage with others. It also means doing the stuff that’s so easy for me to put off, but makes me feel so great when I get them done- cleaning, self-maintenance, auto maintenance, money maintenance. It doesn’t look like self-care on paper, but these are the nicest things I can do for myself. To make sure my kitchen sink is empty every day. Ugh. How boring. How true.

I cannot enter a new year without a list of goals, but I am thinking about them differently this time around. The way for me to get them is to create space, not to do more, be more, make more.