The Artist’s Way: Week 4

This is week 4 of Julia Cameron’s The Artist’s Way. If you’re interested, here are links to the earlier weeks: week 1 / week 2 / week 3.

READING DEPRIVATION WEEK!

This is the scariest week of The Artist’s Way so far. Because there’s one simple yet utterly dreadful condition for this week: NO READING AT ALL.

I actually started preparing for this week in Week 3 by scaling back on reading. And, knowing I had a big writing assignment this week, I prepared by doing the reading in advance (on Sunday night). In theory, I was well-prepared for the week of deprivation.

Emotions-wise, I wasn’t as shocked or dismayed as Julia Cameron anticipated in the book. Instead, I felt a strange sense of relief. So much of my life and work revolves around reading and research that I can’t remember a time when I wasn’t reading. I’ve never allowed myself to. So this week almost felt like a paid holiday for me.

I thought a yawning void would open up, but it didn’t. Not at first, and not how I expected it to. A few days passed. “Nothing’s happening!” I wailed.

Yet almost immediately, I could tell there were subtle changes. I was profoundly irritable, more anxious than usual. I sought out Jon’s company all the time. Needy. I wanted to talk, I wanted words! I caught myself Googling inane things like bike washing tips and recipes that I had no intention of cooking. I compulsively did crossword puzzles.

Of course, life went on as per normal. I did my writing assignment, working off my notes and understanding of the topic rather than research. I thought about things to buy for myself and Jon and the house and shopped for them on Carousell. I did Deliveroo. I looked after the pets. I washed, sorted, and dried rescued fruit and vegetables. I dismantled my old broken bike, a chore I had put off for a month. I cleaned, I cooked, I ate dinner, I got groceries. Not super glamorous, but that’s my life.

Still, I had an extra 2 or 3 hours before bed I didn’t know what to do with. During those times I often reached for my notebook and wrote. I felt scared of being alone, without words.

I’m in a toxic relationship with books.

For the first time in a long time, I felt at peace with myself. And then I realised that I've been in a toxic relationship with books!

I think that reading all these books, as enjoyable as it is, actually made me hold my life to the standards found therein. Self-improvement-y non-fiction books especially. But often fiction books make me feel just as anxious about myself, too. For example, Walden both inspires me and makes me feel anxious that I’m not “XYZ” enough. So, too, do Sherlock Holmes and Veronica Mars.

I guess there isn’t a huge difference between me and someone following a lot of aspirational content creators on Instagram? Like, that fitness IG account starts by inspiring you to start going to the gym, and then, at some point, it tips you over into eating or exercising disorder territory.

The more self-improvement I read, the worse I feel. I look at my messy timetable and my messy brain full of half-baked projects, and I hate what I see. I try out new “systems” and “hacks” in the hope that one day I will be that person who’s totally clear about her values and mission in life and has the daily routine to prove it. In other words, someone loveable.

I don’t have that same feeling with The Artist’s Way though. Maybe I was never super invested in thinking about myself as an artist anyway, so I didn’t come to the book with expectations of a 100-day booty transformation. Or maybe it’s because it’s more like a workbook than a book book. In this case, I author the vision of my potential self rather than encounter it personified in someone else…

Knowing that my Walden book is going to be in the genre that caused me so much self-anxiety, do I really want to continue writing it? I don’t know. I’ve put it on hold for the time being.

Making room for myself.

The other exercises this week are very much about connecting with the self. The selfish self, not the fake goody-two-shoes pretending to be nice to everyone else.

One task is to look for a private, secret spot in the house. I nearly jumped out of my skin because I had been doing the exact thing right before reading the chapter. (Not the first time I’ve experienced this synchronicity with The Artist’s Way!)

My new “spot” is in the kitchen. I moved my chair and desk all the way to the end of the kitchen, the spot furthest from the external world (the corridor with its traffic, the pets with their demands). So screened-off is this spot that even Jon can come by and make tea with minimal disturbance. And it has the 3 amenities I need: toilet, water, and window.

Then there were the exercises where we wrote letters from our 8- and 80-year-old selves to our present selves. Both my selves said the same things to me:

You are objectively in the best season of your life. So fucking lighten up & enjoy it already. Stop looking for things to feel bad about or trying to live up to others’ standards. (Yes, book characters also count as “others”.) You don’t need to justify shit to anyone else.

Week 4 check-in

Morning pages: 7/7

Artist date: I don’t seem to be able to do these very well. I had planned a Me Day with double yoga on Tuesday, intending to people-watch at the busy street junction. But I wasn’t really in the mood and I didn’t enjoy the outing. 

But on Wednesday Jon and I went on a shopping trip to Plaza Singapura and maybe that redeemed things a little? I had so much fun at Daiso, Spotlight, and Art Friend… I completely lost myself in the pencil and eraser section. I bought colour pencils and a box of Staedtler 2B pencils and the chio-est eraser ever.

Issues this week: Not sure if it’s an issue exactly. But I applied for some part-time jobs and listed my bunny boarding business and both are taking off way more quickly than I had expected. As much as I want to dip my toes into these new ventures, I am also afraid of letting go of my current (and much more lucrative) freelance writing work, especially in the really expensive times we live in.