I used to rush through life…until I realized I didn’t have to. Working from rest now, is such a gift. But I’m not going to lie, I’m working on a huge collage that I’m getting only one step at a time. There is absolutely no rushing this thing…and I feel like I want to rush it. Thank for the reminder. I obviously needed it.
The thought that I am behind on a creative project often pops up, but I try to remind myself of all the times in the past where I had to wait for that next step suddenly appearing to move me on - finding a collage image, hearing a quote, wise words from a friend, an insight from nature. Oliver Burkeman writes about inspiration showing up just in time, not in advance, and I think that's true. Everything unfolds at the right time, we just need patience and to keep paying attention . . .
Wonderful writing and wisdom as always, thank you Jim! They say cats have nine lives. I feel I have lived many different versions of myself. Every day now, I treat as a chance to create and enjoy myself. At 55, I feel I am finally being me! Best wishes, Helen.
“That to be an artist is to live and die many times in our lives.” So true. Who wants to embrace death? But to lean into finishing the very thing that is forging a new identity or idea, (I think) is where our desire to create stems from in the first place. It requires humility and perseverance to keep going and finish. Maybe the art we desire to create is actually creation wanting to develop and shape us through our surrender in showing up. Doing the hard thing. Even if it takes a lifetime to get “there”.
I’ll probably re-read this a few times. I love the depth of introspection and truth you invite us into. As always, thanks for sharing 💫I
Beautiful reflexion, Stefani, and I think you get to the heart of it. The strange thing is that I think when you go into that nucleus point of a project (where you've gone in so far into the depth of it), either something in you shatters in the creation of it, or you risk losing it because you can't bear what it's asking of you to create it. There is a type of death that happens in that moment. It's death in the cosmic sense, in that part of you is cracking off and part of you is leaving something of what it was that you were behind.
That death becomes, symbolically, a part of one's own renewal cycle, which is embodied in its purest sense through the artwork itself. These are the moments that move me to the core and make life have meaning and make sense to me, even if it's sometimes hard to talk about it. When you do, the imagery you need to use to describe it is necessarily brutal, even if its result is extraordinarily beautiful.
I think the real challenge is staying present through each stage and trusting that every stage belongs in the becoming. The more I try to rush the chapter, the more I miss what it's here to teach me.
Hey Sadaf, I think the paradox is that once you the pain of feeling that, for whatever reason, one has wasted too much time, that it's almost human nature to then want to try and compensate for it by rushing through and trying to catch up with all those fleeting moments that will never get back. The paradox is, I think, that you can't do all at once what you haven't done before, but you can choose from this point to live life forward.
I know in those moments we don't feel particularly strategic, and we can sometimes even feel manic and all the things that we like to make up for. I think it's worthwhile to resolve, rather than giving oneself over to the fantasy that you can turn everything around in an instant, that you can rather turn it around through the gentle resolution. That you will show up as best you can for your own life and for the things that matter to you in the best way that you can, even if flawed as you go forward.
In this, the decision not to rush but to be in time and to value time and humble before it is a far more powerful strategy than the application of willpower. I hope that makes some type of sense, and if it's far over the mark, then please consider it only a gentle meditation from someone in an amusing state of mind on a Saturday evening. I hope you're very well. Keep in there and keep going. Jim, you
Thank you! I do agree on being in time… recently I have realized that everything happened for a reason, although I “missed” or am late to so many achievements that I anticipated for myself, today, I am exactly where I supposed to be, the right time and right place!
And Celeste, thank you for taking the moment to feed back and to encourage me. It goes a long way to give me fuel to carry on sending you the best this Saturday night, Jim.
There are times your work showing you her new face. The darkness shifts and you can see a glowing you‘d never realized before because you walked a long time side by side and didn’t turn your head.
I so very appreciate this lovely feedback, Olivia. I hope you're having a beautiful week. I'm digging in a little bit this Thursday night, trying to complete a bunch of things that never seem to want to complete themselves, such as the path sometimes, right?
I appreciate you messaging the notion so eloquently, Jim. You nailed it when you said: "that all of the time you put into the song is not wasted but stored. When you finally finish it, you know that, on some level, every single moment that went into the song mattered." Sweet!
Thanks, Jim. Hope you too have a wonderful day at sea, sir:)
Journey vs destination. I go back and forth with this all the time. I like to say I get things done at my own pace, but of course, we all have our own definitions of pace.
Enjoyed this. I need to read your piece at this specific time.
I think knowing your pace is utterly key — and I think the actual tempo matters far less than people think. Everyone shouts about intensity, but no great project get made with intensity. It takes, rather, endurance. That is, the ability to stick with it over time. I’d even go so far as to say that hyper intensity more often indicates insecurity. That is, the deeper worry, that one will give up and pivot. I support your pace Carl! Thank you for the kind — and thought provoking — reply! Jim
Jim, what resonated with me most was your distinction between finishing a chapter and living it. We often imagine creative work as something we produce, yet your essay gently argues the opposite—that our deepest projects are also producing us. The longer we remain with them, the more they reshape the person who first set out to create them.
I found myself particularly lingering over your thought that "the longer time inches forward, the further we drift from the Self we were at a project's inception." That is a beautifully unsettling observation. Every long creative endeavour becomes a conversation between two versions of ourselves: the one who began with hope, and the one who must eventually return with greater wisdom to complete what was started. The work, in that sense, becomes a bridge across time.
I am happy to subscribe because your reflections on creativity, time, and the inner life of an artist feel less like productivity advice and more like companionship for those of us navigating long creative journeys. Your writing invites the reader not merely to think about the creative process, but to inhabit it.
I write at The Reflective State, where reflective essays and atmospheric fiction often explore how our projects, our landscapes, and our experiences quietly shape the people we become. If curiosity ever leads you there, I'd be delighted to have you visit and share your thoughts. I have a feeling you might especially enjoy Quiet Solitude, which also grew from an unhurried encounter and gradually unfolded into a meditation on presence, transformation, and allowing life to reveal its deeper lessons in its own time.
I’m humbled by the depth of your reading here, and which are so articulately expressed.
To add a nuance:
As we know — so many art projects are never completed.
The paradox is that once you become the new version of yourself through it, the spirit — mad jester that it is — always inclines towards expressing itself in that new state, rather than suffering the labour of completing the vision of the older version.
One can understand why one feels that way.
The jester is light, and grasping towards all things new and shiny.
The trouble is — I think — that the wisdom you speak of — potential in the art project — does not fully emerge until the burden is carried to completion.
Wisdom, to my understanding, has to suffer the burden of the past, as well as the dream of the future.
But it must be carried by the courage in the present.
My God, its easier to move on than to complete things.
But I wonder — by doing so are we ever really completed?
Jim, I think you’ve added something essential to the thought here. There is indeed a difference between being changed by the making and being completed by the making. Perhaps transformation is what the creative process gives the artist, while completion is what the artist ultimately owes the work.
I particularly love your idea that wisdom must carry both “the burden of the past” and “the dream of the future,” through courage exercised in the present. There is something deeply true in that. The temptation to abandon a work may sometimes arise precisely because we have already received our gift from it—we have become someone new. What remains is the harder act of giving the work its own ending.
And perhaps that is the final transformation the unfinished work asks of us: not the exhilaration of becoming, but the discipline of remaining.
Thank you for extending the conversation in such a thoughtful direction, Jim. I suspect I’ll be carrying this idea with me for some time. Grateful for you too—and very glad our paths have crossed here.
Man I hear you, Jim! Nicely put. I've been stuck so to speak trying to "finish" a song I'm working on and really believe in. I've "died" a number of times with it along the journey, but it is forcing me to feel more and think less...to keep digging at the root system for the gold which I know surely lies beneath. Hell, you've inspired me to grab a shovel and get back to digging:)
Hey Jesse, what a beautiful reflexion. It's a very strange thing with songs, isn't it? Because sometimes all they seem to ask for is chunks of your life. What I mean by that is that they just ask for time. So often that time is not really rewarded, or it feels like it's not being rewarded in the moment. It's asking that you invest so much of yourself and your soul and your time and your love and your spirit for the promise that you can get to the damn thing.
I went through this very deeply with my album Chromatic Zero, which I've finished now and which involved a year of breaking myself upon writer's block and various old demons about talent, time, and whether it was worth it professionally to go on at all. What I do know, though, is that all of the time you put into the song is not wasted but stored. When you finally finish it, you know that, on some level, every single moment that went into the song mattered. The song couldn't have been written without what it asked of you and, probably more pertinently, what it asked you to become in order for it to become.
I wish you love and luck, spirit, inspiration, a good wrestle with the demon, and a degree of the important thing that we must never forget, which is fun as you take it on.
And Anne, thank you as ever for your energy. I hope you're having a wonderful weekend. I'm catching up with my energy here. I'm feeling quite relaxed today. Hope you are too, Jim.
I used to rush through life…until I realized I didn’t have to. Working from rest now, is such a gift. But I’m not going to lie, I’m working on a huge collage that I’m getting only one step at a time. There is absolutely no rushing this thing…and I feel like I want to rush it. Thank for the reminder. I obviously needed it.
The thought that I am behind on a creative project often pops up, but I try to remind myself of all the times in the past where I had to wait for that next step suddenly appearing to move me on - finding a collage image, hearing a quote, wise words from a friend, an insight from nature. Oliver Burkeman writes about inspiration showing up just in time, not in advance, and I think that's true. Everything unfolds at the right time, we just need patience and to keep paying attention . . .
Wonderful writing and wisdom as always, thank you Jim! They say cats have nine lives. I feel I have lived many different versions of myself. Every day now, I treat as a chance to create and enjoy myself. At 55, I feel I am finally being me! Best wishes, Helen.
Most beautiful words! To become yourself more - to dare to become yourself — the greatest of all adventures 🫶
Beautiful notions, Jim. Your words land just as I needed them most.
Thank you. 🙏
Appreciate so very much brother!
“That to be an artist is to live and die many times in our lives.” So true. Who wants to embrace death? But to lean into finishing the very thing that is forging a new identity or idea, (I think) is where our desire to create stems from in the first place. It requires humility and perseverance to keep going and finish. Maybe the art we desire to create is actually creation wanting to develop and shape us through our surrender in showing up. Doing the hard thing. Even if it takes a lifetime to get “there”.
I’ll probably re-read this a few times. I love the depth of introspection and truth you invite us into. As always, thanks for sharing 💫I
Beautiful reflexion, Stefani, and I think you get to the heart of it. The strange thing is that I think when you go into that nucleus point of a project (where you've gone in so far into the depth of it), either something in you shatters in the creation of it, or you risk losing it because you can't bear what it's asking of you to create it. There is a type of death that happens in that moment. It's death in the cosmic sense, in that part of you is cracking off and part of you is leaving something of what it was that you were behind.
That death becomes, symbolically, a part of one's own renewal cycle, which is embodied in its purest sense through the artwork itself. These are the moments that move me to the core and make life have meaning and make sense to me, even if it's sometimes hard to talk about it. When you do, the imagery you need to use to describe it is necessarily brutal, even if its result is extraordinarily beautiful.
Thank you for reflecting this with your insight.
Jim
I think the real challenge is staying present through each stage and trusting that every stage belongs in the becoming. The more I try to rush the chapter, the more I miss what it's here to teach me.
Beautiful reflexion as ever, Amy. Thank you. I hope you're having a lovely weekend. I'm allowing life to catch up today, and it feels wonderful.
Jim
Honestly I feel like I have wasted enough to rush now but anytime I do it life hits me im the head and I need time to recover again.
Hey Sadaf, I think the paradox is that once you the pain of feeling that, for whatever reason, one has wasted too much time, that it's almost human nature to then want to try and compensate for it by rushing through and trying to catch up with all those fleeting moments that will never get back. The paradox is, I think, that you can't do all at once what you haven't done before, but you can choose from this point to live life forward.
I know in those moments we don't feel particularly strategic, and we can sometimes even feel manic and all the things that we like to make up for. I think it's worthwhile to resolve, rather than giving oneself over to the fantasy that you can turn everything around in an instant, that you can rather turn it around through the gentle resolution. That you will show up as best you can for your own life and for the things that matter to you in the best way that you can, even if flawed as you go forward.
In this, the decision not to rush but to be in time and to value time and humble before it is a far more powerful strategy than the application of willpower. I hope that makes some type of sense, and if it's far over the mark, then please consider it only a gentle meditation from someone in an amusing state of mind on a Saturday evening. I hope you're very well. Keep in there and keep going. Jim, you
Thank you! I do agree on being in time… recently I have realized that everything happened for a reason, although I “missed” or am late to so many achievements that I anticipated for myself, today, I am exactly where I supposed to be, the right time and right place!
A beautiful reflection Sadaf - I’m inspired by your arrival in you
Thanks for the reminder to just slow down and simply be in it.
And Celeste, thank you for taking the moment to feed back and to encourage me. It goes a long way to give me fuel to carry on sending you the best this Saturday night, Jim.
There are times your work showing you her new face. The darkness shifts and you can see a glowing you‘d never realized before because you walked a long time side by side and didn’t turn your head.
Beautiful words as ever Daniela — thank you, always, for your gentle reflections. Your words so often knit little things together 🫶
So relatable and clarifying Jim. Thank. You!
I so very appreciate this lovely feedback, Olivia. I hope you're having a beautiful week. I'm digging in a little bit this Thursday night, trying to complete a bunch of things that never seem to want to complete themselves, such as the path sometimes, right?
I appreciate you messaging the notion so eloquently, Jim. You nailed it when you said: "that all of the time you put into the song is not wasted but stored. When you finally finish it, you know that, on some level, every single moment that went into the song mattered." Sweet!
Thanks, Jim. Hope you too have a wonderful day at sea, sir:)
Journey vs destination. I go back and forth with this all the time. I like to say I get things done at my own pace, but of course, we all have our own definitions of pace.
Enjoyed this. I need to read your piece at this specific time.
I think knowing your pace is utterly key — and I think the actual tempo matters far less than people think. Everyone shouts about intensity, but no great project get made with intensity. It takes, rather, endurance. That is, the ability to stick with it over time. I’d even go so far as to say that hyper intensity more often indicates insecurity. That is, the deeper worry, that one will give up and pivot. I support your pace Carl! Thank you for the kind — and thought provoking — reply! Jim
Jim, what resonated with me most was your distinction between finishing a chapter and living it. We often imagine creative work as something we produce, yet your essay gently argues the opposite—that our deepest projects are also producing us. The longer we remain with them, the more they reshape the person who first set out to create them.
I found myself particularly lingering over your thought that "the longer time inches forward, the further we drift from the Self we were at a project's inception." That is a beautifully unsettling observation. Every long creative endeavour becomes a conversation between two versions of ourselves: the one who began with hope, and the one who must eventually return with greater wisdom to complete what was started. The work, in that sense, becomes a bridge across time.
I am happy to subscribe because your reflections on creativity, time, and the inner life of an artist feel less like productivity advice and more like companionship for those of us navigating long creative journeys. Your writing invites the reader not merely to think about the creative process, but to inhabit it.
I write at The Reflective State, where reflective essays and atmospheric fiction often explore how our projects, our landscapes, and our experiences quietly shape the people we become. If curiosity ever leads you there, I'd be delighted to have you visit and share your thoughts. I have a feeling you might especially enjoy Quiet Solitude, which also grew from an unhurried encounter and gradually unfolded into a meditation on presence, transformation, and allowing life to reveal its deeper lessons in its own time.
Dear Siddhartha,
I’m humbled by the depth of your reading here, and which are so articulately expressed.
To add a nuance:
As we know — so many art projects are never completed.
The paradox is that once you become the new version of yourself through it, the spirit — mad jester that it is — always inclines towards expressing itself in that new state, rather than suffering the labour of completing the vision of the older version.
One can understand why one feels that way.
The jester is light, and grasping towards all things new and shiny.
The trouble is — I think — that the wisdom you speak of — potential in the art project — does not fully emerge until the burden is carried to completion.
Wisdom, to my understanding, has to suffer the burden of the past, as well as the dream of the future.
But it must be carried by the courage in the present.
My God, its easier to move on than to complete things.
But I wonder — by doing so are we ever really completed?
Grateful for you, and to you.
Will be following along.
With love,
Jim
Jim, I think you’ve added something essential to the thought here. There is indeed a difference between being changed by the making and being completed by the making. Perhaps transformation is what the creative process gives the artist, while completion is what the artist ultimately owes the work.
I particularly love your idea that wisdom must carry both “the burden of the past” and “the dream of the future,” through courage exercised in the present. There is something deeply true in that. The temptation to abandon a work may sometimes arise precisely because we have already received our gift from it—we have become someone new. What remains is the harder act of giving the work its own ending.
And perhaps that is the final transformation the unfinished work asks of us: not the exhilaration of becoming, but the discipline of remaining.
Thank you for extending the conversation in such a thoughtful direction, Jim. I suspect I’ll be carrying this idea with me for some time. Grateful for you too—and very glad our paths have crossed here.
Man I hear you, Jim! Nicely put. I've been stuck so to speak trying to "finish" a song I'm working on and really believe in. I've "died" a number of times with it along the journey, but it is forcing me to feel more and think less...to keep digging at the root system for the gold which I know surely lies beneath. Hell, you've inspired me to grab a shovel and get back to digging:)
It's a wonderful day at sea sir. Thank you!
Hey Jesse, what a beautiful reflexion. It's a very strange thing with songs, isn't it? Because sometimes all they seem to ask for is chunks of your life. What I mean by that is that they just ask for time. So often that time is not really rewarded, or it feels like it's not being rewarded in the moment. It's asking that you invest so much of yourself and your soul and your time and your love and your spirit for the promise that you can get to the damn thing.
I went through this very deeply with my album Chromatic Zero, which I've finished now and which involved a year of breaking myself upon writer's block and various old demons about talent, time, and whether it was worth it professionally to go on at all. What I do know, though, is that all of the time you put into the song is not wasted but stored. When you finally finish it, you know that, on some level, every single moment that went into the song mattered. The song couldn't have been written without what it asked of you and, probably more pertinently, what it asked you to become in order for it to become.
I wish you love and luck, spirit, inspiration, a good wrestle with the demon, and a degree of the important thing that we must never forget, which is fun as you take it on.
Take care,
Jim
Hell yes to this!: "I do think we are always underprepared for how we experience time within the chapters of our lives."
Also, thanks for reminding me to not rush through what wants to be lived.
And Anne, thank you as ever for your energy. I hope you're having a wonderful weekend. I'm catching up with my energy here. I'm feeling quite relaxed today. Hope you are too, Jim.