Less/More
Happy 1-year Substack birthday!
A year ago today, I sent out the first official Creative Fuel newsletter via Substack.
I had been writing Creative Fuel as a monthly newsletter since 2019, and thanks to my friend
, I took the leap last year to move it over to this platform, in the hopes that I could grow it in new ways, do things like interviews, and yes, monetize it. Let’s all remind ourselves: creative work is labor.Now here we are a year later. Which I guess is a birthday of sorts? I’m all for celebrating even the smallest of milestones, so YAY, one year of writing on Substack! Now I want cake.
As you all know, I treat January as an in-between month, and I was fortunate to spend the last few weeks at an art residency. Which means that I’ve had quite a bit of time to sit on some ideas, be in conversation about said ideas, read a lot of books and do a lot of scribbles, slowly lay the foundation for new projects.
Back in January, as a part of
’s 30-day drawing habit, I did Julia Rothman’s More/Less list. There were a few things on there that I have been thinking a lot about in these last weeks.More: Depth and Ease.
Less: Overextended Tentacles.
Envision an octopus with its tentacles spread out in all directions. This is often how I feel, the result of being (like probably many of you who read this newsletter) someone who does a variety of things for work. It’s fun to work in this way—even thrilling at times as you jump between ideas, spaces, and topics and somehow connect them all together—but quite regularly I get overextended. Exhausted. Stretched thin. At which point, I have to remind myself to pull the tentacles in.
This is why “depth” was on the list. When you do a lot of things, taking the time the go deeper on a topic can sometimes feel out of reach. You’re overextended, but you don’t always feel like you have much to show for it.
To think about this in a different way, I like to envision a tree with deep roots, extending far down into the soil. “Charles Darwin once wrote, in effect, that the tips of plant roots are like the brains of plants. Roots sense the environment. They sense the water, where there are more nutrients, and they go for these resources. Roots are the smartest part of the plant,” said Ying Fan Reinfelder, reflecting on his own research, and the plasticity of roots.
What are the root systems of our personal creative curiosities? I think about the root example in context of how we humans seek out information, how we find connections. After all, our brains are “plastic” too, with the ability to change and re-wire. Perhaps no surprise that neural pathways look remarkably similar to root systems (just look at these beautiful images).
Our own minds are strengthened by extending, by getting new information, but they also suffer from distraction and information overload. Online brain is a thing. You know that feeling you sometimes get when you’ve read and listened to a bunch of stuff, but when someone asks you to recall an article you read recently, you draw a total blank? That’s what I’m trying to avoid.
A few days after I made my More/Less list, I added to it. On the More list, I wrote, “less.” And on the Less list, I wrote “more.” More of less and less of more. A clear reminder to myself to not just take on more for the sake of more.
Intuitively this makes a lot of sense. In practice, it’s much harder. Particularly in a culture that is in constant demand of more. I can feel that tension quite a bit writing this newsletter, especially when I want to ensure that all of you feel like you’re getting what you signed up for.
Here are two things that I know:
We don’t become more creative by just taking more in.
We don’t become more creative by just putting more out.
Creativity is not a singular practice. We engage in both input and output, and this in-and-out breathing process of creativity is ongoing. Creative practice is internal AND external. It is process AND outcome driven. It needs deadlines AND expansiveness. It flows AND it stagnates. It is solitary AND collaborative. It takes work.
We ebb and flow. We pause. We hit a wall. We re-energize and come back to moments of heightened production. We’re not editorial calendars or machines, we’re humans. “Human beings” not “human doings,” remember?
If you keep a notebook/sketchbook/process book/some kind of a collection of scribbles and scrawls, you don’t have to go too far to see how wide the creative web can be cast. Some random things written down on recent pages in my notebook: “blue, blue, blue,” “corvidae,” and “why are colored pencils so fun?” We plant seeds for ourselves all the time, but don’t always take the time to tend to them.
That’s to say: there is SO MUCH TO BE CURIOUS ABOUT, so much that could be explored.
February is an excellent month for new beginnings, and for recommitting to the things we already have in process. It’s a ripe time to take stock. As I think about this newsletter, and what I want for this space here—this little corner of the internet, this little community—it is not more for more’s sake. I want depth.
The thing about depth? It takes time. It takes attention. It takes actively choosing to remove some things to make room for others.
Depth can often feel out of our hands, especially in an economy where we’re all just on an endless treadmill of the self-promotion. Where’s the time and space for depth when there’s content to be churned out?
I want to resist that urge. I want to create a space that asks us all to engage more with the world around us. To not avoid and distract, but to feel. To not assume, but to think, to be curious. To make connections, to extend our own root systems.
In terms of a publishing schedule, I think that means something a little looser, a little more organic. Or simply trying things and seeing what’s fun! I do have some upcoming things this month (like creative prompts for Freeflow Institute’s Connect to Cold campaign), as well as some more community-focused events and workshops down the line. But mostly, I want to make things a little more fluid, a little more organic.
I want to make more space for depth.
So that we can all extend our roots a little deeper.
Thanks for being here. Go eat some cake! That’s the one thing I would like more of.
-Anna
“I can never get over when you're on the beach how beautiful the sand looks and the water washes it away and straightens it up and the trees and the grass all look great. I think having land and not ruining it is the most beautiful art that anybody could ever want to own.”
- Andy Warhol
“I think many of us write because we can’t help it, because it’s a jealous lover or a hunger that can’t be sated or whatever metaphor works for you. When that leaves us, even if it’s only for a while, we still have what’s left: we write for one another. And what a gift that is. Stories can break empires; they can tell our hearts we’re not alone. They make us laugh. They make us grateful to be alive.”
in “This Counts.” Antonia often calls her pieces “walking compositions” and if you’re like me and constantly playing around with words in your head while you walk, then I think you’ll appreciate that sentiment.As of right now, the main perk for paid subscribers—you know, besides my endless gratitude and knowing that you help make this whole newsletter happen—is access to seasonal editions (I currently have three planned this year!) but I’m always thinking of other ways to offer up some other behind-the-scenes stuff and creative inspiration. So I figured I would bring you some pictures of art-in-progress from my recent residency.