Gaiman Says Make Good Art

12 May 2013

Layers were peeled off. I saw myself, my ethos separated in sheets. The main question of what I am going to do with this life persists.

I am so afraid. I might actually be going crazy; the probability is more evident. Last night, a single image came to my mind. I wanted to dissolve it; to take it out of my mind’s eye; to not think about it at all. My mind was obstinate. I was pushing the image away but it taunts me. Brain vs brain – the autonomous vs the subservient. It’s a civil war! The vision already pained me.

My psyche revealed its levels to me.  I know that the psyche exists and that its dimensions are undeniable but it’s different to have to face them as reality through experience. I physiologically had a hard time breathing.  I was pleading; even praying for it to go away. Peace has eluded me. Where is my faith? Stress from work has changed me. I am broken and I don’t even know if I can be restored. In reality I was doing nothing. June and Paul were doing the bulk of the job. I am in misery. There was no validation of my existence. I am not satisfied with my outputs as well. It was daunting to incite and watch yourself to go to war against each other.

Even my loved ones are bothered already. I am sorry that Sam had to see me breaking down – laughing and crying at the same time. Should I keep on with my work if I am already becoming a different person; also unknown to me, disruptive to other people’s lives? The situation is unhealthy for me.

Lord, I’m sure you have given me this because this is something You know I could handle but because my being is in discord – with my mind, heart and body out of harmony, doubt is beside me. Will You let me go out of this? What will I become at the end of this, a sounding board, a mute being, a passive snail? Or will I melt out, either passivity kicked out of me or my sensitivity engulfing me into an oblivious existence in an imagined world? You provide me with strength according to my need; will this make me insane? Is this my breaking point? You give me those I thought impossible – both the wonderful and the aching. Will I make it through this? Am I not completely broken? My rock, am I not smashed to bits before You? So You giveth, so You taketh away; I’ve lost my sense of self and my self-reliance. My confidence is in its all time low. To me I am nothing but a pair of arms, a set of eyes and before I sleep through enumerating, a warm body, I lack energy because my purpose is unclear.

What will actually come out of this that I’m going through? I can’t see it yet. My temporal thoughts drone: the world would be a better place for you. The trite what doesn’t kill you makes you stronger buzzes. I allowed myself to be pillaged and pulverized. I feel so violated; I allowed myself to feel useless and incompetent. If James Morrison hasn’t put it in words, it will be more unbearable; I’d snap into insanity faster: And I know that it’s a wonderful world but I can’t feel it right now. It’s the I know vs the I feel. I don’t know if I’d push through with challenging myself to this or if I would back out lest I be totally lost even to myself. I am capacitating myself at a slower pace than the erosion the situation brings to my existence. Demolishing me is way easier than building me up. Would it be worth it to be destroyed? Would You rebuild me?

Why should I write about this? I have no other idea for the moment how this would be useful. Maybe Neil Gaiman is right, that this is how it is to make good art. In this sense I am a creator. I only create without intending to make it beautiful – only to make something. So Neil Gaiman, thank you for the positive connotation of making good art, an immediate inert assumption that what I make whatever the current situation is is not only art but good art.