That is my Starting Point
In my experience, responding to any situation with the phrase “I don’t know” is the equivalent a lighting the fuse on a stick of dynamite. It is a nice way to spark anger and start an argument. Why am I responsible for having the answers other people do not even know themselves? Beware of anyone who entitles themselves an expert. I am not an expert. Yet I have some knowledge of things. I have questions.
It took me a long time to make peace with the idea of “I don’t know”. Why bullshit a false answer? It is better to admit to my own Knowledge Gap. And seek to find an answer or a new and different Possibility. Marcus Aurelius’ stating “The Obstacle is the Way” has become my internal mantra. The last year has proven this to be true. At least for myself.
If you hide your ignorance, no one will hit you and you’ll never learn.
Ray Bradbury
The year that was and the year ahead of me is one of Reworking My Own Process. My own Education. It is more about My Own Process. Real education is about process and not a final product. I need to be more in the library and the workshop of my own making. And avoiding the bureaucracy of learning via the Established System. I do not need to fund Gate Keepers and such to let them tell me how I should be running my process. Though, I am still seeking those willing to take on the role of a Mentor. A fellow Wanderer. Or two. Makers. Builders. Dreamers. Inquiring Minds. It is about taking Direction without being hung up with making specific Destinations.
I am always doing that which I cannot do, in order that I may learn how to do it.
Pablo Picasso
I became a fan of the show Brojects. It is a show about two brothers who commit to building projects around their cottage. And they are not professional builders. The projects really embrace the idea of Trial and Error.
I relate this show to a quote from Nick Cave.
“All of our days are numbered. We cannot afford to be idle. To act on a bad idea is better than to not act at all because the worth of the idea never becomes apparent until you do it. Sometimes this idea can be the smallest thing in the world; a little flame that you hunch over and cup with your hand and pray will not be extinguished by all the storm that howls about it. If you can hold on to that flame, great things can be constructed around it; things that are massive and powerful and world changing. All held up by the tiniest of ideas.” (from the film, 20,000 Days on Earth)
The picture here is a cut from a 70-year-old maple tree that used to be in mom’s backyard. Last fall, as I was cleaning up what was left of the tree. There was this piece and I thought maybe I could make an outdoor table out of it.
How?
I DON’T KNOW.
Right now, I am just working on stripping the bark off. And it has been a very slow process that still has a way to go.
After that is done. What is my next step?
I don’t know.
Yet. Maybe?
This is my Daily Meditation. Something to take a break to focus on.
It is just the time for me to just Make. Do. And just Move about. Rethink and remake my own Workshop Space. And once again. Just Do. Turn on My Music and Tune Out as much of my distractions as possible. Mistakes will be made. But that is what duct tape is for. Why the pencil has an eraser attached to it. And in more extreme moments. Band Aids.
As Chase Jarvis posted “Make It Til You Make it”.
And Maria Forleo’s saying that Everything is “Figureoutable”.
The chief enemy of creativity is ‘good” sense
-Pablo Picasso
Skin and Bruises 