Creative Threat: The Seven Deadly Sins, or "Showing My Backside"
One of the greatest threats to creative production is
self-doubt, and it is my suspicion (Lord, protect me from the deadly sin of pride
and vanity) that one of all artists’ greatest challenges is thought. Thinking too
much about it instead of doing it. When we let the questioning overstep the
doing, we have lost sight of the ball. Every day, we can’t help but ask questions,
of course, and these questions are what lead us beyond vanity to aspire to our personal
best. Is it good enough? Is it done enough? Is it smart enough? Is it funny
enough? Is it new enough? Will the critics like it? Ask away, but then file
away the question marks and bring out the periods and exclamation points. And
the hard returns. We shall. We shall!
We do. Period.
A blog is a place we explore unfinished thoughts; a book is
where we finish them, yes? I have so many half-filled jars of writing ideas on
the shelf today that I don’t know which one to pull down to show you. I am
mostly certainly warming up toward that book or books (thanks for joining me in
the pre-game stretching, and Jonathan, you might hear from me) but until then, there
are observations asking to be written and shared. Because these thoughts are
hard, and long, I admit that I tend to avoid the more complicated topics. Continually
one of my biggest concerns is being accused of Pride (just who do you think you
are, young lady?) and Vanity (just
why do you think they care?) and
also, a tiny dollop of Sloth (am I really
interested in putting in the work to get these thoughts out in a way that
matters? And God, that seems hard to make that experience as beautiful in words as it was
in real life) and, also, possibly most importantly, the other deadly sins
of Anger and Gluttony: THERE IS NO HALF AND HALF FOR MY COFFEE THIS MORNING. Lust, Greed, Envy: Well: Obviously.

I have no idea. But here we are. Hi. Allow me to show you my
backside.
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