Happy New Year...

Just a word to thank those of you who check in on "Persist: The Blog" from time to time. I trust that, if you find no current entries, you toggle over to The Buddha Diaries, where I write entries almost every day. All of them, I think, are relevant to the issue at hand here. In today's entry you'll find a wish for the New Year. I wish you all the most creative and successful of all years!

Please Note...

... my guest post today at Sweep the Dust, Push the Dirt.

Good Artist/Bad Person?

For those who were interested in the dilemma I referred to a couple of days ago, in my entry titled "Distraction," a follow-up piece in today's entry in The Buddha Diaries may also be of interest. It's called "Speaking of Nazis..." With reference, particularly, to the life and work of Martin Heidegger, it raises a familiar question: is it possible to be a really bad person and a good artist--or, in Heidegger's case, philosopher/writer? Conversely, does being a really good person preclude the possibility of being a really good artist? (I don't come up with an answer!)

"The Marriage Artist"

Please, today, click over to my entry on The Buddha Diaries for a review of The Marriage Artist, an excellent new novel by Andrew Winer.

Distraction

It's not that I have forgotten about Persist: The Blog; it's rather that I have been choosing to keep up with my posts at The Buddha Diaries. But Thanksgiving came along to remind me just how easy it is to get distracted, and how easily distraction can slip over into laziness and neglect.

It's a problem I know I share with virtually every other creative person on the planet. Oh, I know there are some writers and some artists out there whose discipline--obsession?--is such that nothing will ever distract them. They keep at it seven days a week, rain or shine, holiday or no holiday, despite family and friends. I'm not among them. Actually, the truth is that they kind of piss me off! They hold up an overly polished mirror in which I readily see all my imagined faults. There is some part of me, I confess, that's out to shame me for not sharing that dedication. The part that nags at my conscience, whispering "you should..."

Should I? I have to ask myself what I want for myself as a writer. Is there some truth in the argument that to be the true artist, the successful artist, I must abandon every other aspect of my life, including family and friends, and dedicate myself exclusively to my art? The stories of such people are legion--and legend--along with the havoc they wreak in their own lives and the lives of those they love. When I feel envious--and there are times I do--of writers whose names are better known than mine, and whose bank balances are much healthier, I ask myself if I would have met with more success had I chosen to follow their example.

And I do think that may be what it takes to achieve true greatness--the pursuit of one's vision to the exclusion of everything else. It's just not something I'm built for. Family means a great deal to me, as does the time I devote to pursuits other than my writing. For me, then, it's a balance; and like all balancing acts, it requires constant vigilance if I'm to avoid toppling over and falling off the wire. I do need awareness if I want to "persist" in the work I'm given to do; I need to watch my mind when it attaches to the distractions that inevitably come along, and bring it back gently to where it needs to be.

The Big Time?

(Cross-posted at The Buddha Diaries)

I was utterly astounded--and of course delighted--to find prominent mention of my "other blog," The Buddha Diaries, in the lead-in to a featured article in the New York Review of Books by Janet Malcolm, "Comedy Central on the Mall." It refers to my entry on November 1st about the Jon Stewart Rally to Restore Sanity, and occupies the first two paragraphs of the article. Reading the whole piece, I regretted only that Malcolm had not read the follow-up article I wrote on 11/11, after seeing a recorded version of what took place onstage--a disappointing affair, I thought. Still, wonderful to find so prominent a mention of the blog. I would perhaps not have stumbled across this without a tip from my friend and fellow blogger, Bill Harryman, at Integral Options Cafe. My thanks to him!

I hope you'll help me celebrate by forwarding the link to others who might be interested.

Miriam Wosk: A Follow-Up

I hope that my post today on The Buddha Diaries will be of interest to readers of Persist: The Blog. Just the click of the mouse away! My friend Miriam was the model of "persistence" as an artist...