As I plan my five days of creative exploration, I find myself gradually letting go of my obsessive tendencies. I’m getting okay with less than perfection. I’m accepting loose prompts and tentative ideas over filling my datebook. By nature I live by to-do lists. I can hardly function if I haven’t written down the next thing I’m supposed to do.

For this week, I have instead compiled a list of DON’T DO’S:

  1. Don’t think about work, and don’t feel any guilt whatsoever about not being there.
  2. Resist the urge to organize, clean, or otherwise improve the house or anything in it. Anything that can’t wait five days must be serious enough for a professional to worry about, not me.
  3. Don’t use your day planner or make any appointments. Keep your time completely free for the Muse to take over.
  4. Don’t work on lesser projects such as sewing or crochet. These can wait, and are easily done without wasting precious vacation days.
  5. Don’t think about marketing or an audience for your art. Do it for you. Do it as an act of worship. Be organic.
  6. Don’t get distracted by the time suck that is the internet. All the great artists have become so without social networking. You don’t need it.
I will update this blog throughout the five days IF I feel so inspired. Otherwise I’ll just jot down thoughts in a journal and return here with a wrap-up post at the end of it all. (And I’ll be damned if I don’t feel just fine about leaving that tentative, too.)
The goal is not perfection. The goal is to follow the Muse. The goal is action–quit preparing and just DO it. The goal is catharsis. Practice. Growth. Inspiration. Beating Resistance. The goal is freedom.

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