as simple as it can be
I don't ask for much. Most extravagances seems burdensome and unappealing. Most luxuries seem tedious, unnecessary, and uninteresting. I'm a person of simple pleasures and even simpler needs.
What I need most is simplicity.
But simple isn't the same as easy. In fact, few things are as complicated as living simply.
I crave clarity, but the world is so convoluted. I long for linearity but everything moves circuitously. I prize understanding above almost anything, but i look around and it all seems so confusing.
Purpose is met with pointlessness. Energy is confounded by inertia and apathy.
What does it mean when you can't make sense of anything? Or, when the sense you can make means nothing? What do you do, then?
"[T]here can be meaning without making sense", Anne Lamott says, and I've only ever known one way to find it: be as kind as you can, read good books, and make things.
Maybe that's all there is.
Maybe that's all there is to it.
Maybe that's all anyone can do.
Maybe that's as simple as it can be.
P.S. ICAD - Day 237-240 - the collages below are available for purchase here.
P.P.S. - I made a video for my paid subscribers earlier this week about some of the processes, thoughts, and ideas that went into this post. I’ve never been a fan of paywalls, but I’m so grateful for the people that have chosen to invest in what I do that I feel compelled to show my appreciation. More to come. Thanks for everything!
this is (not) a process video
It occurs to me that what happens at the vault is only one part of my creative process. It many ways it’s the culmination of a longer, more circuitous, and seemingly unrelated series of processes that sustain my daily practice at the vault.
Great point about: "But simple isn't the same as easy. In fact, few things are as complicated as living simply." It's funny how simple and easy are too often connected as basically the same thing these days. It's almost as though the mind sometimes cannot comprehend simplicity and needs to complicate things as proof of its own existence. In some ways the ego mind reminds me of a dog barking and listening to an echo of then spirals into more barking. Haha - I hope this makes sense! I like that collage titled: "some sentences like bricks." Interesting.
Thanks for sharing the link to your storefront. Buying art is a pleasure.