Moving Through Lethargy
I decided to write an article today in spite of the flat feeling that I have nothing to say. If I can just push through this feeling of deadness, I have at least a chance to spark a little fire with my dedication that may throw enough light for the next step.
There have been so many times throughout my life as a working artist that I have struggled with this kind of lethargy.
Lethargy - n. morbid drowsiness; unnatural prolonged slumber; apathy.
The best medicine I know to lift this kind of deadness is to do something creative, even if it is clumsy and second rate. Because when I begin to move forward regardless of this mopey dullness that has for some reason found me and covered me over like a thick fog, following a creative scent no matter how faint is always my way back to myself.
In Anne Lamott’s funny, warmhearted book on writing, Bird by Bird, she refers to what she calls “shitty first drafts” as the path to how real work gets made.
“Almost all good writing begins with terrible first efforts. You need to start somewhere.”
I’m at my work table this morning writing to you, surrounded by a group of paintings all in various states of completion, with a Chicago exhibition looming in a little more than two months. I have no idea where the money will come from in order to both frame them and then ship them from Paris. This is only one of my many current unknowns that I am living with.
This, my friend, is what living a life of faith looks like from ground level. It feels like a radical dependence on God’s grace and mercy, a kind of utter vulnerability in the daily warp and woof of day-to-day existence. Living like this brings Scriptures like this to life:
“Keep your life free from the love of money, and be content with what you have, for he has said, ‘I will never leave or forsake you.’”
Hebrews 13:5
Living inside the tension between life needs and no current visible solution is the very space a relationship with God takes on actual heft and vigor. What does faith actually do when the solution remains invisible? Faith says take the next step regardless. Do what you can with what you have. Guard your heart against worry by remaining grateful, because when you move towards gratitude, worry begins to lose its hold.
“Faith by itself, if it does not have works, is dead.”
James 2:17
Faith requires action, however humble, in order to come alive. This morning it was typing the beginning of this article to you, trusting that even though lethargy was doing its best to engulf me, I could still choose to believe that there might be an article wanting to come to life on the other side.
Creativity and faith both ask us to act before we can see the finished thing. Perhaps struggle is necessary.
Think of Jacob at the ford of the Jabbok wrestling with the angel. Think of Vincent van Gogh waiting for his next letter from his brother Theo with just enough money to get him through the next month. Think of the Wright brothers out on the cold, windy landscape of Kitty Hawk trying to do what nearly everyone thought was crazy or impossible. They were the sons of a Christian minister, living at a time when some even wondered whether human flight trespassed into a realm God had never intended for us.
Beautiful things take labor to get born. Your own birth and mine are testimony to this most basic truth. If we can just remember that this is an essential aspect of our story, then we can accept it not as a sort of necessary evil, but as what living in the spark plug gap of real living is all about.
That specific gap that the mechanic adjusts when he is tuning up your engine under the hood is important. Not too far and not too close. He’s tuning it to a professional perfection. Just remember, the gaps you are living with in your life are all opportunities for ignition.
No gap, no spark. No uncertainty, no need for trust.
So I can now say that I am still at my work table, and that cold, clammy fog of lethargy has almost entirely dissipated. I have a new article to share with you and, as a result, an even stronger trust that these new paintings will not only arrive at Gallery Victor on time, but will arrive well framed and ready to hang.