When the pandemic really got underway here in the United States, I found all of my creative energy drying up. I used all of my energy just trying to keep up with and understand a staggering amount of new information. It felt like each hour there was a fresh new piece of horror to digest.
Creative pursuits can often help with anxiety; and art, at its most basic level, can help make sense of the world.
But creativity takes focus and mental energy.
I think sometimes people get the idea that since hobbies and art practices help with anxiety, that they are always easy and relaxing in the moment of creation. The reality is that different projects take different amounts of, sometimes, serious concentration. So the sad fact is that there are moments when creativity is elusive, and they often line up with times people are in the most distress.
All of this is a roundabout way of saying that for a while I hadn’t done shit.
Slowly, though, I’ve found creativity creeping its’ way back into my daily life. Unsurprisingly, the first finished project of the pandemic era has been a pair of socks for my daughter. It’s not surprising since, for me, socks are a fairly mindless endeavor. My brain still can’t take huge amounts of focus at once but it can now focus enough to knit in circles. Progress.
