Ordinary things take on new meaning when you see them with fresh eyes.
On a recent creative retreat in the tropics, largely unplugged and undistracted by the perils and exasperations of daily life, I touched the ground with bare feet. Broad leafed trees sprawled and stretched everywhere, massive emerald canopies drooping in languorous abandon. As soon as I arrived I immediately luxuriated in the sight of their curvaceous edges and wide, richly colored bodies, connected to immense stems live living sculpture. I didn’t ponder their evolution exactly, nor did I spend much time comparing them to mental images of leaves closer to home. I simply noticed them. I enjoyed their arcs, their hues, their immensity, their intensity. Surrounded by them everywhere I walked, I was reminded constantly that the world is large and there are nearly limitless sensations to experience in even the most ordinary things.
Beyond those trees, I took pleasure in the shapes of tiled roofs, rippled like terra-cotta corduroy sloping down to meet long gutters running to downspouts. I welcomed the fast rising and fast setting tropical sun, a daily transition between bright and night that took on a lyrical quality, an agreeable change of key. I even smiled at the busted roads, complete with local drivers of dust-covered heaps that never made it above 40KPH.
In working sessions I paid attention to technique, motivation, intention, and above all actually doing something substantive. My deal with myself was that I couldn’t just walk away from working on what I initially set out to do. To be clear, creative work like this isn’t exactly hard. Removed from the churn of normal days, creative work becomes its own reward. The biggest challenge is to commit to your own promises to yourself.
On the final morning I re-filled my water bottle, preparing for a long, bumpy ride back to a small airport and an inevitably tedious day of anodyne travel. Above the fountain, a small batik of two elephants with intertwined trunks hung on the wall. I’d noticed this otherwise unremarkable decoration throughout the entire week every time I’d gotten water, but until that moment it had hardly been more relevant than an equally unremarkable pair of plain wooden benches on the nearby patio. On that final day those elephants became something more. The painting did not improve, and neither did the trees themselves. The ordinary benches stayed rooted in space, soaked in blazing, ever-present afternoon sun. What caused the transformation for me was the stinging awareness that I would not likely see these particular sights again, ordinary as they may be. Their ordinariness, their rootedness to place without profundity beyond simple existence, describes the beating heart of being fully present.
My work comes with me. Empowered by ordinary laptops and paper notebooks and small format cameras, geography does not impose many limits unless I’m deep into something large enough that it requires a crew on site (and I love those projects too, BTW!). I’m reminded that I will get stuff done only if I commit to getting it done. (Whether it’s good is another matter entirely.) I’m also reminded that ordinary things are everywhere. The benches, the goofy elephant picture, the water fountain, even the tropical leaves in all directions were not in themselves the source of inspiration. Inspiration comes from following through with goals. It comes from doing the work. It comes from noticing events of the day, the chaos of monkeys howling in the trees, the acrid tang of a poorly maintained pick-up truck’s exhaust, the sweet burst of a freshly picked orange.
What makes those ordinary things take on extraordinary velocity has to do with allowing yourself to get out of your usual day-to-day experiences. The ordinary sight of broad leaves and bright sun are not in themselves inspirational. What inspires is the potential that you might actually be fully present in your life for a fleeting moment to stand under the shade of those leaves, and then feel the warmth of the sun when you step out into the light.