Routine (Part 2) Breaking One

In my last post, I discussed the impact routine has had on my life. It does. In a big way. There are times though when my old chaotically obsessed self, needs a release. Those times are usually when there is a project I have fallen in love with. Then, I give myself permission to go all the way. Mostly because I still believe that there are some projects that need a different type of process. That need to be fueled by obsession. That are worth the strain on my body and mind.

It is a conscious decision. One I am completely aware of and before I get into it, I prep. I organise every aspect of my life that I possibly can. I clean my house from top to bottom, I fill my fridge with as many healthy, easy to access snacks I can think of and also some junk for when it gets really bad. I make all the undesired phone calls I have to, I see my loved ones and warn them that I will be M.I.A for a while. I lock my front door and I dive. Into a bottomless pit. My favourite place in the world.  

There is much to be said about obsession and creativity. For this chain of thought that has no beginning and no end. This un-routined time closely resembles, for me at least, a kind of paganistic ritual. My work there is to conjure up a force that will guide me to somewhere unknown. My only real job is to show up, through idea after idea after idea, until exhaustion becomes a type of spiritual guide leading me into that 'aha moment'. During those times I keep my notebook by my bedside, including sleep as part of the process. Jotting ideas down throughout my unsettled sleep. Waking, eating, working, sleeping, waking, eating, working, sleeping, until there is an epiphany. One that I can't help but feel I had nothing to do with. An idea that was born through me but not by me. Those kinds of ideas can only happen with this kind of process and when they do, most of the time, I don't understand them. My gut tells me it's a great idea, but it takes many months after its' birth to really understand what it is that I have done.
Routine is good, but so is obsession. So long as there is an awareness of it and a promise of a beginning and an end. Once my epiphany has arrived, I claw my way out of my bottomless pit and I sleep. Until I feel rested. Rested enough to clean up the wreckage that is my life, to look in the mirror again an remember I exist, to unlock my front door, and to go and see the people I love.