“ Orphaned believers, skeptical dreamers, you’re welcome.
You can stay right here. You don’t have to go.
Linford Detweiler
“ The Dude abides.
Jeff “The Dude” Lebowski
Saying it out loud changes things.
I’ve been mulling this concept over for some time, and just seem to keep running into it. My paraphrase above is a condensate from various books, movies, mythologies, and especially conversations … I suppose really I’m experiencing the newly-purchased-object-supersaturation effect: having just obtained a shiny new whatever, it suddenly confronts you at every damn turn due to your hyperawareness of it. But anyway. This to say that at the very least, I felt the need to sort of air my mind on the subject.
One. God is supposed to have said, “Let there be light.” I like this idea, and can relate to the extent that I sort of talk alone (I wouldn’t say “to myself” because I’m not most usually addressing myself) a decent bit when I’m in the creative throes. Is there something about soundwaves? Penetrating space and matter with our very urges? I don’t know, but it sure feels like something’s up with that.
Two. Catching up with friends and relatives, there is always the obligatory “So what’re you up to?” which happens a lot at this holiday-dense time of year. And I find myself using different words to describe the same ideas I have to different people. Sometimes it’s because I think a certain person will understand one particular angle on a subject, other times I’ve had a few drinks and my internal thesaurus is working overtime to fill in the blanks, and still other times I am just plain bored of saying the same thing and having it feel like I’m reciting a line. Regardless of scenario, the outcome can be a surprisingly creative endeavor in its own right, and it frequently influences the initial idea simply by endeavoring to relate it.
Three. And this is obvious, but people have opinions and ideas that you’re bound to hear if you speak your own. I secretly dislike the idea of being so directly influenced by someone else, though of course it happens. But I think it’s more interesting to consider each of us as a carrier or surrogate of sorts, uniquely suited to incubate and eventually produce what may have originated as a mere kernel said only in passing.
So I guess it would be appropriate that I resolve to say it out loud more often this year. And sketch. And write. And produce in general. But my true difficulty will be to say it more.
Yesterday I was eating something and I thought to myself, “Ooh, spicy.” Then I sort of frowned and turned the word “spicy” over in my head a few more times and realized the cause of discomfort with my internal word choice. “Spicy” is too often relegated only to the ideas of hot, sharp and peppery, while the world of spices is so very broad and rich. Why shouldn’t a creamy chai tea be considered spicy? Or gingerbread? Or any number of spiced delights? So please, next time you bite into a gooey cinnamon roll at breakfast, don’t be afraid to call it what it is.
