I really appreciate it when friends share great stuff with me. Since this one is pretty great, I’m sharing it with you, too.
In any creative feat
(by which I mean your work, your art, your life)
There will be downtimes.
Or so it seems.
Just as the earth is busy before the harvest
And a baby grows before its birth,
There is no silence in you.
There is no time of nothingness.
What if,
During the quiet times,
When the idea flow is hushed and hard to find
You trusted (and yes, I mean trusted)
That the well was filling, the waters moving?
What if you trusted
That for the rest of eternity,
Without prodding, without self-discipline,
Without getting over being yourself,
You would be gifted every ounce of productivity you need?
What would leave you? What would open?
And what if during the quiet times you ate great meals
And leaned back to smile at the stars,
And saw them there, as they always are,
Nourishing you?
There are seasons
And harvest is only a fraction of one of them.
There is a rhythm that made everything.
The next time you stand in the kitchen, leaning,
The next time a moment of silence catches you there,
Hear it, that rhythm, and let it place a stone in your spine.
Let it bring you some place beautiful.
DAVID BERRY is the author of “A More Daring Life: Finding Voice at the Crossroads of Change” and the founder of RULE13 Learning. He speaks and writes about the complexity of leading in a changing world.
