Productivity and Poems

I just wrote five hundred words on working with our inner critic, reread it, and deleted it all. If that isn’t some kind of metaphor, then I don’t know what is. My inner critic took one look at the clunky way I was trying to communicate some deep truth and decided to throw the whole thing out. Instead, it reminded me of a poem by the late, great, Andrea Gibson that says everything I was trying to say, but better.

Spider by Andrea Gibson

All of my pain is a spider 
I’ve learned not to crush 
with the heel of my shoe 

but to guide with a page 
of my journal 
into an empty glass. 

I ask questions about 
its life, its purpose 
as I walk careful 

out to the garden and rest 
it down on the earth. 
My pain—how happy 

it is to leave me 
whenever I treat it 
kind. 

That’s it. That was what I was trying to say. When we treat the critical parts of ourselves with kindness, they stop been the bogeymen of our nightmares and actual start teaching us things we might need to know.

I’m releasing a book in September—you might have heard—and it’s a tremendously daunting endeavor. I do it all myself, choosing to walk a path that I forged rather than wait for someone official to open the gate for me. With that comes all sorts of self-doubt. Is this worth doing? Is it a real job to make up stories? Can I honestly ask someone else to read something that hasn’t been given the imprimatur of the traditional publishers?

And when I let myself sit quietly and instead, ask back, “What is the purpose of this? Why is this important?” the answers amaze me. Because they’re not about books, or writing, or even a job. They’re about life. They’re about my place in the world.

I don’t want to make a fool of myself. I don’t want to move through the world, wondering if people think of me as less than a real grown up with this sometimes ridiculous job (and it is definitely ridiculous at times). I don’t want to look back and wonder if any of it mattered.

Those words are true for a lot of people, and a lot of jobs. These commonplace fears that we aren’t real people if we aren’t doing serious things. In my opinion, they come from a place that has twisted what it is to be a human in our society. That has decided that some ways of living are serious and meaningful and others…not so much.

I once knew a man who said, outright, that he believed people’s value was based on how much money they made. No amount of arguing would sway him. Rich people were valuable, poor people less so. It was offensive, ridiculous.

It was also honest. He’s not the only person who thinks that way. So many of us have ranking systems for each other, whether that’s status, beauty, wealth, or even something more understandable, like how our jobs impact others positively. Who is going to say that a pediatric oncologist doesn’t do more for the world than a landscaper?

Over the last few years, I’ve come to realize that creating a hierarchy of value based on usefulness can be just as destructive as one based on wealth. I think it’s good to do good. I think we should all be as kind and giving as we can. But if we base our worth on that? Well, then our inner critic starts having a field day. Because if we create value with our usefulness, what happens when we get sick? Or burned out? Or if the world no longer needs what we have to give?

Are we worthless then?

Many would say yes, but I would argue that doing good work out of a fear of losing worth…it twists everything, doesn’t it? We’ve all known that person who is so devoted to the good mission that they stop treating others with kindness. They stop seeing other people as people. They’re only resources to be used or obstacles to be overcome. And the good work isn’t so good then, is it?

This is longer than I meant it to be, and more rambling than I’d hoped, so I’m going to finish with another poem, one that says everything I am trying to say, but better. Take care, friends.

Wild Geese by Mary Oliver

You do not have to be good.
You do not have to walk on your knees
for a hundred miles through the desert repenting.
You only have to let the soft animal of your body
love what it loves.
Tell me about despair, yours, and I will tell you mine.
Meanwhile the world goes on.
Meanwhile the sun and the clear pebbles of the rain
are moving across the landscapes,
over the prairies and the deep trees,
the mountains and the rivers.
Meanwhile the wild geese, high in the clean blue air,
are heading home again.
Whoever you are, no matter how lonely,
the world offers itself to your imagination,
calls to you like the wild geese, harsh and exciting
over and over announcing your place
in the family of things.