If I had the… will (not time)
I’ve heard it so many times, from artists, from friends, from family and every intersection of people thereof — “I know I could make something, be something, grow something, create something great, but I just don’t have the time” and heck it’s not just about creative acts, the excuses flow from the world of our fitness lives to books we wish to read, to just about anything we think that we want to do but are not pursuing because we “don’t have the time”.
Why do I think that all the people that say these things are bluffing? because I actually have had it — the time, and have had it for some time now. I guess it’s important to mention that I work as a music teacher and have pretty much made my money that way in varied capacities since I was 18 (I’m 30 now) and I’ve never had a full time job (desclaimer: I do know that some folks legit don’t have an ounce of time, I am mainly talking about people who do indeed have the time, but don’t spend on the things they actually want to). My line of reasoning has always gone something like this: “well when it comes down to it, I guess I rather have more time to develop my projects, hone my gifts and produce creative projects than an excess of money.” And let me be clear, if I was naturally a self-motivated, individualistic go-getter, I surely would have produced a great catalog of works to be inherited by the ages and the great museums of the world by now (cough, yeah, for sure).
Yet one of the great gifts that comes from living with oneself over an extended period of time (say 30 years) is the ability to come to terms with one’s natural tendencies and personal weaknesses. So rather than trying desperately to alter my creative DNA and personality traits, I figure I might as well try and find some work-arounds, so that even if I don’t do things the way others do, I still get what I want at the end of the day, namely output.
So once again you might see the motivations for this daily writing endeavor. I am trying to build up the momentum so that one day I can truly live the Artist’s dream and be a creative hermit who delves deep into the infinities of pure form, sound and color and makes trips into town from that great unknown to brings back glorious evidence(and also buy salami), instead of someone who gets distracted by Youtube warm holes and often forgets to do the thing most important to him: practice.
Yet there are certainly tradeoffs and trade-ons that come with working alone, or experiencing the magic that comes from collaboration. As I’ve mentioned, I’m not the ultra-productive loner type. I want to be around people, I want to bounce an idea off someone else’s idea and watch it refract around the room or conversation or song. Yet sometimes the roads are too narrow for a whole expedition party and you must go it alone.
In that some vain, I happened to be stumbling around Youtube when I saw a clip from a Dave Grohl interview in which he was asked if he comes down to his basement studio and just works on the drum set on his own, to which he replied “oh hell no, I can’t do anything just by myself” (I paraphrase here). I was kind of surprised by this fact and it was a great reminder of the way that some of use are wired for collaboration.
Editors note: I know that my ability to form concise thoughts in written form will greatly increase as time goes on, and now is the hardest part of the process, because I have the ability to see the flaws, yet not the experience to easily fix them — so, let me try and wrap up this whole post in one sentence: Sometimes people talk about how they don’t have time to be creative - I do have time to be creative and wast it just like them, therefore it’s not about the time, but rather having the will to get something done, by whatever means necessary. Carry on:
I don’t know, maybe because my primary instrument like Dave’s is the drum set which is really not a solo instrument or because I enjoy riffing off the energy that other people bring, but I love to collaborate, improvise, and create with other. The hard part is, what I’m doing now; trying to be coherent, trying to subdivide my ideas into manageable chunks, trying to build my creative muscle by running with cinderblocks on my shoulders through a snow filled tundra… alone (for now).
