2/28/2021

i liked david mamet's class. i'm almost at the end of it. i like how he asks, "so you want to be a writer, what's stopping you?" and how he says that "if you want to be a writer, you figure it out." a lot of being a writer, being anything, involves a kind of commitment. it involves just being willing to sit there and face your shit, the doubt within you, the ugliness you produce... and just making an effort to work it out. i also like how he says that, every day, you do two things: one for your business, and one for your art. i think this is true...

the thing is that there are many things that i want to do, many things that i feel almost compelled to do in order to stay active, and stay alive. and because there are so many things, it is very difficult for me to do "everything" "every day." moreover, there are a lot of things in work, and my present circumstances, that impose themselves upon me. also, my respondibilities to my children, to my wife... to others, in short. i do realize that i tend to be a very self-serving individual in that respect. i just want to improve, or produce. that is what i long for. the feeling of accomplishment. because it replaces the disappointment that always underlies everything...

*****

when you ask yourself "why" you want to do anything... what serves as the basis or critereon for a valid answer? i think, for a long time, that i was convinced of a utilitarian basis... that is, what "use" accomplishing something had. and i think that that is the basis for a lot of people. parents. me, as a parent. that we should only encourage activities that have some kind of payback. i think i look at myself a lot like that still. why do i do anything? why do i want to do it? i think nowadays a lot of what justifies things is that it confers some kind of power. some kind of interest. like playing the piano... but then again, what's wrong with that? i think the "why" question ends up being like sitting in an interrogation chair and trying to provide reasons that people want to hear, reasons that are acceptable. what if you just want to do things because they make you feel "cool"? i think of dancing, for example, dancing in certain ways... what's wrong with it? maybe there will never be an opportunity for them, and maybe there will never be eyes to see them... so what's wrong with that? movement. feeling. does it need a purpose, or an audience?

*****

i think i have gotten over some of the myth of "starting over." maybe this is the longest streak i have maintained, on this routine. i feel that there is power in this, in keeping to things. and i will keep to this as long as i am able to. i'm sure the routine will change, but the promise i have kept with myself will remain. and i hope that, if nothing else, my ability to "sit" with myself and finish things will only grow stronger. for i think, as mamet says, that that is the true secret to things. too many times, we are trying to find the "easy way out," and think that we're not on the right path so long as things remain difficult. but most of the time, it is simply a matter of sticking with the difficulty, with "figuring it out."

so i hope... i hope that i stay with things, i hope i can "figure" my life out...