Stuck

This will be brief.  I've got 30 mins before I get the boot from the coffee shop that I call a second office while I'm in Portage.  But come hell or high water, I'm going to get this done. And this may be a bit of an exercise in narcissism... you've been warned.  

I've been feeling creatively stuck over the last few weeks.  I haven't been able to write anything on this blog "worthy" of hitting that orange PUBLISH button.  I haven't been able to write any lyrics for the couple of songs that I have melodies and progressions for.  This week I have really struggled with trying to write my newsletter that I send to people regarding my work with Youth For Christ.  

I sit down to do some of this creative "work" and it's like I open the door to what I assume will be a finely 

appointed room and it's a vacant warehouse.  Wide open, no defining decor, no furniture, not even a broken down crate to sit on.  Just a wide open space that doesn't say "look at all the opportunities", rather it cries out "there is nothing here to offer."  

Nothing to offer.  That's fitting I think of how I have been feeling lately with my work, ie. the day job that pays the bills.  There are times when I meet with people and feel like I have offered something of benefit, something of worth, something where I feel like I've earned my paycheque.  And then there are seasons where I wonder if the person across the floor is thinking, "you must be joking.  That's the best you have?"  

That doesn't mean that I've been in a low spot emotionally, I really have been feeling pretty well.  So the good part is I feel just fine about being inferior and useless.  That sounds more awkward than intended.  

I've learned a lot recently about a friend of mine who is highly creative and a musical whiz.  He's the kind of guy that I love hearing what he's working on and excited for him while at the same time trying to figure out if there is some way I can magically suck all his creative genius out and steal it for myself.  I'm not proud of that but there it is. What he has taught me is something of what he has recently been putting into practice.  That is you sit down and you do the creative work even when you don't feel like it.  Even when it feels like your ass has 50 pounds of lead in it you pick up your blunt instrument and go up the hill.  

What's the point of this rant? Great question.  I don't think there is one, I think every word on this one is the goal.  For myself, writing this has shown me that how I have been feeling as I sit with hurting people and as I stare at a blank page have striking similarities.  "I'm not enough, I don't know enough, I wish I knew more."  In the past this sentiment has sent me to searching for new musical gear ("if only I could get THAT I would play more") or scrambling for professional development seminars ("If only I knew THAT I would be better").  There's nothing wrong with new gear or development.  I love them both.  

And there's nothing wrong with me. 

And there's certainly nothing wrong with you.  

That doesn't mean that there's not more to learn, there always is.  But not knowing everything doesn't mean that we are not enough. 

I tell that to people all the time because so many people I work with have this wired in, burned in sense that they are not enough and that there must be something wrong with them.  

Sometimes we need to hear the message we tell others.  Sometimes we need the words we freely give to be heard in our own ears.  

So my apologies for the rant and the navel gazing.  But it's been helpful to this guy.  Perhaps somewhat helpful to you.