{"id":29608,"date":"2020-09-18T09:28:33","date_gmt":"2020-09-17T23:28:33","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.tomgrimshaw.com\/tomsblog\/?p=29608"},"modified":"2020-09-18T09:28:33","modified_gmt":"2020-09-17T23:28:33","slug":"create-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.tomgrimshaw.com\/tomsblog\/?p=29608","title":{"rendered":"Create!"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
\"Kurt<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

(Tom: Golly gee gosh I love this advice! It is so good I am sharing it again. If you get a fraction as much from it as I got your day will be immeasurably enhanced.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Take joy in some creation today!)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The point is not to Win, but to do, to experience, to become.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

With thanks to Vera Risdon and Kurt Vonnegut.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In 2006 a high school English teacher asked students to write a famous author and ask for advice. Kurt Vonnegut was the only one to respond – and his response is magnificent:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cDear Xavier High School, and Ms. Lockwood, and Messrs Perin, McFeely, Batten, Maurer and Congiusta:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I thank you for your friendly letters. You sure know how to cheer up a really old geezer (84) in his sunset years. I don\u2019t make public appearances any more because I now resemble nothing so much as an iguana.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

What I had to say to you, moreover, would not take long, to wit: Practice any art, music, singing, dancing, acting, drawing, painting, sculpting, poetry, fiction, essays, reportage, no matter how well or badly, not to get money and fame, but to experience becoming, to find out what\u2019s inside you, to make your soul grow.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Seriously! I mean starting right now, do art and do it for the rest of your lives. Draw a funny or nice picture of Ms. Lockwood, and give it to her. Dance home after school, and sing in the shower and on and on. Make a face in your mashed potatoes. Pretend you\u2019re Count Dracula.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Here\u2019s an assignment for tonight, and I hope Ms. Lockwood will flunk you if you don\u2019t do it: Write a six line poem, about anything, but rhymed. No fair tennis without a net. Make it as good as you possibly can. But don\u2019t tell anybody what you\u2019re doing. Don\u2019t show it or recite it to anybody, not even your girlfriend or parents or whatever, or Ms. Lockwood. OK?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Tear it up into teeny-weeny pieces, and discard them into widely separated trash recepticals. You will find that you have already been gloriously rewarded for your poem. You have experienced becoming, learned a lot more about what\u2019s inside you, and you have made your soul grow.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

God bless you all!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Kurt Vonnegut\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

(Tom: Golly gee gosh I love this advice! It is so good I am sharing it again. If you get a fraction as much from it as I got your day will be immeasurably enhanced. Take joy in some creation today!) The point is not to Win, but to do, to experience, to become. With … <\/p>\n

Continue reading “Create!”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5,6,8],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-29608","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-general-interest","category-health-tips","category-inspiration"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tomgrimshaw.com\/tomsblog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29608","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tomgrimshaw.com\/tomsblog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tomgrimshaw.com\/tomsblog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tomgrimshaw.com\/tomsblog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tomgrimshaw.com\/tomsblog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=29608"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.tomgrimshaw.com\/tomsblog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29608\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":29610,"href":"https:\/\/www.tomgrimshaw.com\/tomsblog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29608\/revisions\/29610"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tomgrimshaw.com\/tomsblog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=29608"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tomgrimshaw.com\/tomsblog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=29608"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tomgrimshaw.com\/tomsblog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=29608"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}