An Empty Cup

Writing is an output procedure. You take all the inspiration you’ve accumulated - personal stories, piecemeal sounds from disparate records, and the melodies floating around in your heard - and synthesize them into something new. By the end of the writing process, we produce one song or a litany of them. There is a beauty to this creation, this divine act of art making. But, on the other side of creation, we might be visited by a feeling of emptiness. 

There are those of us who, in the days and weeks after a profoundly productive period, may be asking ourselves if we will ever be so full of inspiration again. We might try and manifest it or write through these weeks of refraction to no avail. Slowly, we come to realize that our cups which once runneth over are now sitting empty on the nightstand. 

I encourage you to not be afraid of these moments, the brief pauses when your deep well of creativity does not produce water. Instead, take this time to live, learn, and seek stimulation. Walk aimlessly. Make new friends. Listen to records for hours on the floor of your room. Party all night with the unknown characters of your town. Return home to commune with older relatives. Read memoirs and fiction and obituaries. Develop a new hobby. Do all the things that give life a bit of sparkle until you feel the urgent itch to once again fashion your stories into song.

Remind yourself that you have not lost the piece of you that makes you a songwriter. There is no need to force yourself to write when the divine spark of inspiration will inevitably visit you again.