BEGIN!   July 3, 2014

I don’t know quite where to begin, but I have been wanting to start a blog for many years now, but I don’t know where to begin. But I have been wanting to …

I teach a college course on the nature of creativity and use choreographer, Twyla Tharpe’s book The Creative Habit as a primary text. She offers wisdom for those of us who can’t quite start the big project we’ve been dreaming about because we are overwhelmed by the sheer size of the task and can’t find a way in. To us, Tharpe says:

                                 “BEGIN!”

Simply begin somewhere, anywhere. It doesn’t matter where. It doesn’t need to be at the beginning of the story. Just start and eventually you will carve pathways that lead you forward. I’m not sure about so many things: how often I will write, if there will be a consistent theme, topic or format… And so, even still, I begin. I imagine that the shape of this offering will form itself as I continue to write.

Years ago, before the ferocious Midwestern storms took down so many of our trees in our ½ acre back yard, Fall leaf raking was an arduous task. I have this memory of standing in the middle of our yard, buried practically up to my knees in crimson, gold, and fire orange leaves, leaning on my rake and moaning at the magnitude of the task in front of me. Where would I even begin?!!  I decided that I would just start raking – right there in the middle of the yard. You have to start somewhere.

Is there a project that has been scratching at your soul? The thing you never have enough time to do? Well…

BEGIN…

and the path will present itself