Summer Time and the Living is Easy.

It is (officially) summertime once again and I love it. I've been riding my bike like a fiend and reading books that I want to read. I finished my grad-work for the summer last friday and I finished my first book on Thursday. I read Catcher in the Rye and now I'm on to Catch 22 by Joseph Heller. I've got a goal to read at least 10 books before the summer is over in August. My new summer work schedule is pretty bomb. I go to work at 11:30am and get off anywhere from 7:30-9pm. A summer work schedule like this is hard to beat.

I've really been aching for some creativity lately and have found myself soaking up some writing technics I've discovered through StumbleUpon. I'm going to start writing next week and try to produce a new story each week. So I will be sure to post a few of my works on here. I'm realizing what has always stopped me from completing the task is the fear of making mistakes.

This is a mental road block that must be conquered to truly produce art or you never get anywhere. Last summer I read a short little book by David Bayles and Ted Orland called Art & Fear. And in it they present a parable of sorts of an art teacher who did an experiment with his students by grading half the class on the quality of the work they produce and the other half on the quantity of work they produced throughout the semester. The class soon discovered that those who were required to produced more work were able to produce better quality work. They didn't have the time to be nit-picky so they learned what worked and what didn't overtime and were able to perfect their craft. The students graded on quality focused on one final product and stressed and toiled over that one piece to the point where any life that had been found in their work had been sucked out of it. And now this summer I keep coming across this idea. I found a quote by Ira Glass where he gives advice to artists in the beginning of their creative process:

Summer has been going pretty great so far. I can't complain anyways. I hope to make it up to the mountains before too long and maybe hit up a fourteener or two, but right now its pretty chill. I just started working 40+ hours a week so that will definitely help me get my feet on the ground financially for awhile and maybe I won't be struggling from paycheck to paycheck. I see this time as a new phase in my life. I'm becoming an adult more and more. I will definitely write about this more soon, esp. after I read Tillich's Courage to Be and May's Courage to Create. I'll keep you posted. Until then, I hope you are enjoying your summer too. Let me know what you're up to this summer. I'm interested to know.

Returning from a Brief Hiatus

So it's been awhile since I last wrote, but today felt as good a time as any to return to the blogosphere. To recap, I have finished my first full year of Seminary and got a job at Cherry Hills Country Club as a Pantry Chef (I make salads and plate desserts; a nice gig). Lindsay and I are growing closer as our relationship continues to move forward and to mature (although we have a lot to learn. I still think we are on the right track).

I have recently come to a few milestones that have shaken me up a bit to think about them. May 8th marked one year since I graduated college. It was a tough pill to swallow that I am one year removed from college. I won't say my college years were the best years of my life, but they sure were fun and I'd be lying if I said I didn't miss it. The other realization I came to was that on May 20th, I had been out of high school for 5 years. That was just so strange. To imagine how much I have grown in one year is mind boggling and to compare myself with the high school version of me there are some striking differences. I'm essentially the same person, but I have just been shaped by life and personal experience and am less of the overly optimistic person I was in high school. I believe much of the change has been happening over the last year. Its crazy to think about how much has happened in the course of a year. Not only that but I have been a resident of the Denver Metro Area now for over a year. This too is pretty strange. C'est la vie. Life keeps on moving regardless of how hard we try to stay in the same spot. And change is good, but it takes some getting used to. I must admit, growing up is easily the hardest thing I'm learning to do. Part of me never wants to grow up, but at the same time there are so many things I want to accomplish that I have had to come to terms with the fact that I must growing up in order to be successful (and at times, even to survive.)

But undoubtedly I am blessed. Blessed to be growing, to know that life still exists inside of me. Now I have just come to the age in my life where I must come to terms with my being. And to discover what it is that I am being molded and shaped for. I am definitely growing as a person and finding pieces to the puzzle of my being but I must keep on working at it. So until I'll keep you in the loop. When I figure out the meaning for my being, I'll let you know. Until next time.