Books and Magic

I don't know how this happened, but I have become the type of person that reads like, five books at once.  I used to always have one fiction and one non-fiction going, but that system has flown out the window the last couple of years.  I'm currently in the midst of 5 books.  Here they are in no particular order....

• Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban by JK Rowling
  
• Mirror for the Soul: A Christian Guide to the Enneagram by Alice Fryling
  
• How We Love by Milan Yerkovich
  
• The Goldfinch by Donna Tart
  
• Big Magic: Creative Living Beyond Fear by Elizabeth Gilbert
  

I blame the app GoodReads for this new habit of reading 4-5 books at a time.  Since I can easily keep track of what I'm reading and how far I'm in a book with GoodReads, I feel comfortable being in the midst of a lot at once.  And I also just decide not to be in a rush to finish.

But since this blog is supposed to be somewhat focused on art and not on literature, I thought I'd share some inspiration from Elizabeth's Gilbert book.  I've mentioned it before, and I'm still s-l-o-w-l-y reading it. I really like this quote.  It's kinda long, but so lovely....

"Making art does sometimes feel like you're holding a seance, or like you're calling out in the night for a wild animal on the prowl. What you're doing seems impossible and even silly, but then you hear the thunder of hooves, and some beautiful beast comes rushing into the glade, searching for you just as urgently as you have been searching for it.
So you must keep trying. you must keep calling out in those dark woods for your own Big Magic. You must search tirelessly and faithfully, hoping against hope to someday experience that divine collision of creative communion--either for the first time, or one more time.
Because when it all comes together, it's amazing. When it all comes together, the only thing you can do is bow down in gratitude, as if you have been granted an audience with the divine.
Because you have."   -Gilbert

i love that!  A lot of times spending time to create does feel silly and fruitless and like I'd be making better use of my limited free time by cleaning out my car or taking a shower.  It's easy to forget those times when it does feel like magic, or to think that it won't ever feel like magic again.

But for now, I'm just going to keep showing up.