Dear Daydreamers,
The end of the school year is busier for our family than Christmastime. There are so many concerts, recitals, plays, graduations, and performances to attend. In the last week of school, the schedule changes for everyone, and I have to scramble to make sure everyone gets everywhere on time.
This week I’ve been swamped with freelance work as well as the school craziness.
One morning I did the dishes, started some laundry, and started an egg boiling. I make my wife a salad for her lunches at work. She works 13-hour night shifts three days a week. I was also finishing a client project. I am the primary cook in our family. Immodestly, I do a damn good job.
I was putting the finishing touches on a video script for a client when I heard a scream like a tea kettle would make—only we don’t have a tea kettle—and then an explosion.
Remember that egg I was boiling? I had just remembered it too.
The water was gone, and the kitchen was covered in egg shrapnel. Apparently, it was an eggslposion that I’d heard.
I shut off the stove and did my best to rescue my pan. Then I had to clean up the mess. Loki loves eggs, so he helped get the stuff off the floor.
I couldn’t believe I had done that. I could’ve started a fire. I felt like an idiot. I’d never done that before.
The problem was that I was doing too much. Multitasking almost never works as well as focusing on one thing at a time. I know that. Yet, I was still seduced by the allure of productivity.
One reason I was in such a rush is I was trying to buy myself more time to work on my poetry. I have two projects I want to finish and publish, but I’ve been having a hard time finding the time.
At least that’s what I tell myself.
The truth is I’ve been stalling. It’s easier to play games on my phone or scroll down social media than it is to do deep work. Once I appraised how I spent my time, I realized that I have a lot of junk time habits. Junk time is like junk food. Stuff you do that has no value, and may even be harmful, but it feels soooo good.
Since the great boiled egg incident, I’ve been better about not succumbing to junk time.
I’ve also been thinking a lot more about what it means to focus as an artist. I believe that to make great art you have to live and experience things. You also have to let your mind wander. At some point, you also have to buckle in and do the creative work.
Last weekend I watched the Sheryl Crow documentary on Showtime and finished the Magic Johnson documentary on Apple+.
Both of these people have a relentless work ethic. They spent all of their spare time working on improving their craft.
What do I have in my life that I love that much? I was afraid to ask myself that question because the answer might be nothing. Then I realized there is something.
Writing.
I’m always writing and not just for my clients. I’ve been privately experimenting with all kinds of different forms and formats lately. It’s my version of doing layups or practicing my scales.
However, to become the artist I long to be, I have to do more than practice—I need to get into the game. I need to test myself. As a poet/writer/illustrator, that means publishing stuff.
It’s been almost a year since I last published a book (it bombed—my very worst results). And in the dark of the night, when it’s easiest to be honest with myself, I admit I’m scared to publish again. If I never finish another book, I won’t have to publish.
The only way forward is to embrace that fear. School ends for everyone today. That means I have more time to do the deep work. It’s time to get my two projects ready for the public.
To help my focus and to better understand my fears, I’ve returned to one of my favorite mindfulness exercises.
I write 10 haiku in one sitting about a single topic that I want to uncover about myself. This exercise always surprises me. I'm often in tears when I get to the last few haiku. Each haiku rips away a layer of superficiality until the deepest part of my soul is exposed.
Today’s challenge is to try this 10 haiku exercise. Pick a topic, one- or two-word topics work best, and write 10 haiku about it. Don’t show the haiku to anyone else. These are for your self-discovery only. You can even throw them away or delete them after you’ve read them over.
While you can be as loose or strict with your haiku as you want, I limit myself to three lines where the first and third lines have 5 syllables and the second line is 7 syllables. This hard limit helps me dig deeper and produces more revealing poems. Something about counting syllables turns off my censor and allows my darkest secrets to leak out onto the page.
This week I’ve written haiku about money, approval, and quality. It usually takes me about a half-hour to get 10 haiku down—but I’ve been writing haiku regularly for six years. It used to take me an hour to do a set of 10. It’s important to do this activity when you have a block of time where you won’t be disturbed.
I’d love to know if this exercise was helpful to you at all. After you try it, leave a comment or reply to this email and let me know how you felt afterwards.
Be the weird you want to see in the world!
Cheers,
Jason
This exercise was
The challenge I needed; I haven’t haiku’ed in a while. Once I got started I couldn’t stop—sleepless on yet another redeye flight east to be with my failing dad. Keeping to one topic wasn’t easy at first then, as haiku usually does for me, the rhythm flowed and as I hustled through 4 airports, I tapped out the melodies in my head.
Most unexpected? Writing 10 haiku on one topic allowed me to repurpose various lines and create new haikus. I ended up with 13 total . Thank you for suggesting a different way to journal my grief-ridden emotions.
Jason, thanks for this great exercise. I think this is what initially drew me in to writing 50-word micros: working within some type of word limit or constraint. Thinking about word choice, sound, syllables - it all matters! Same here with haiku.
I look forward to trying your exercise soon!