My palms were a bit sweaty. I took deep breaths. I felt a bit misty and smiled. A monumental decision for a bloggity being like me… it happened:
I put the comment function out to pasture.
Comments – closed.
Gulp. Sigh. Namaste.
I need to heed my own creative credo:
1. Keep it pointed to where you want it to go.
2. Pay close attention to your creative fantasies.
3. Keep it lean and keep it clean.
4. Art involves risk.
5. Form informs feeling.
1. Keep it pointed to where you want it to go.
If we’ve had a beer or walked the Sea Wall together (I know, only two of my friends are putting their hands up – I’m reclusive,) then you’ve heard me say, “All I want to do is write and speak. Write and speak. Write and speak.” Pretty clear. For flavour, I’ve been adding in, “You know, I just wanna work like Hunter S. Thompson, but without all the bad drugs. Or guns. Or ex-wives. Or…” Okay, the point is, I neeeed to Write and Speak.
And live — and living means making up stories with my six-year-old magic boy. And eating fresh food with friends. And interviewing Rabbis and Lamas and waiters about the nature of desire…So that I have more stuff to write and speak about.
When people start calling you a “power blogger” (I love the label, don’t stop, seriously,) you’re tempted to think that power = blogging. And it can. You just need to keep your eye on your real power source, or you get all fancy and you start wearing sunglasses when you sit down at the computer.
And here’s the thing with being “in touch” with thousands of people everyday: it can mess with your head, not in a Howard Hughes go-looney kind of way, but in a “there are a whole lotta of people in my living room, and my bed, and my car-kind of way.” You see, I THINK about YOU a LOT. I want to be the best hostess on the Internet. I want everyone to know that I read every word that is sent my way. I want to be loved, darling, loved!
Which brings me to…
2. Pay close attention to your creative fantasies.
I’ve been romanticizing the old days of authorship. You bled on typewriter keys, couriered your six inch-high stack of manuscript papers to your editor; and your book came out four years later. If someone wanted to send you love letters or hate mail, they wrote to your publisher, and your publisher asked you if you wanted your mail forwarded to you that year.
That Jurassic and gruelling process is everything I work counter to. I take publishing into my own hands and ship my art ASAP. Howevah…this imagery (I can even smell the dusty dust of old paperbacks, and the ink of typewriter ribbon,) has been surfacing in my thoughts these past weeks and it’s telling me to make the space I need to create more.
If I have more psychic space, I can write more, and write mo’ better. And THAT’s where I want my vocation to go. All good things (like affluence) will come from honouring that core desire. (Quicky clarity on that: affluence = fluid ideas + influencing positive happenings + cash flow.)
3. Keep it lean and keep it clean.
I was reading the Communicatrix’s latest newsletter (Colleen Wainwright slams down the wisdom on a monthly basis and I take in every word.) “Everyone now knows that social-media creep is just as dangerous as TV-creep…” And she advises us to “review your landscape, trim your reel…so we can be…100% available to the moment.”
And then it hit me: Let go. More. Which is scary, but…
4. Art involves risk.
Seth doesn’t have blog comments. Havi doesn’t even do email. When Leo at Zen Habits asked some of his blog-migos what we thought about him closing comments on his site, I was like, “Dude, ‘Zen’ connotes comment–free, you need to let go and let it flow.” But it’s different when it comes your turn to “burn down the barn so you can see the moon” as the poet, Masahide put it.
You start fretting about people calling you a narcissist (wouldn’t be the first time I’ve been misunderstood,) or your readership plummeting (which, uh, couldn’t possibly happen because my material is just going to get HOTTER…promise,) and about being lonely (I still have those two friends to drink beer and walk the sea wall with.)
And…I worry that my new artistic format might come across as ungrateful. And that would suck hard, because I am so deeply, madly, appreciative of every heart that clicks my way and gives some extra meaning to all of this.
The value of being recognized as useful cannot be overstated. @DanielleLaPorte
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Danielle LaPorte is the outspoken creator of The Desire Map, author of The Fire Starter Sessions (Random House/Crown), and co-creator of Your Big Beautiful Book Plan. An inspirational speaker, former think tank exec and business strategist, she writes weekly at DanielleLaPorte.com, where over a million visitors have gone for her straight-up advice — a site that’s been deemed “the best place on-line for kick-ass spirituality”, and was named one of the “Top 100 Websites for Women” by Forbes.
You can also find her on Facebook, Pinterest and Twitter @daniellelaporte.
*Featured image by Carol Walker
