Can I talk a bit candidly again for a few minutes? It might be a rambling of thoughts and ideas but maybe that will be an even more transparent insight into my thoughts at the moment….
I remember back in college.. I first decided that coffee was what I was going to do and nothing could or would hold me back. It never felt like there were any road blocks that could hold back the tidal wave of creativity in my soul that that I was pushing towards my end result.
It was a controlled recklessness.
It was a passion.
It was a desire to launch myself into an unknown so that I could know more – both about me and about this industry and business I knew was my fit in the community.
It was about possibility.
It was about proving anyone that doubted it wrong.
It was full blown creative force in business, design, brand, and self.
But what happened to all of that?
I remember sitting in Bongo Java (I think I’ve talked about this before) and just being overwhelmed by the ideas of what the future could hold. I watched artists, business people, students, pastors, musicians and baristas fill the walls and patio with ideas, creativity and excitement. It was so endless. It was inspirational. It was motivational.
I had books filled with ideas and things that EVOKE was going to stand for both as a shop for people but also as a community member. I had ideas for events, marketing campaigns, table layouts, bar design, branding….. I couldn’t shut it off. I went to sleep thinking about it. I woke up thinking about it. I sat in class and rode my bicycle thinking about it.
Did I burn that candle too hot? Too long? That runaway train of ideas…. options.. I never had a problem jumping on the YES TRAIN when an opportunity presented itself. I just needed to be on that train headed in the “right” direction. That was the ticket.
It will be 4 years in October that I let go of the reins too EVOKE. It didn’t end the way I had written it – not exactly at least. Since then, I have been poking around finding reasons why “the next thing” isn’t right for me.
I’ve been talking myself out of the position and decision making that risk / reward requires. The creativity of hunting down that next thing is what has been missing for me the past few years. It is as if I gave it all to EVOKE and did not reserve any for myself. Is that even possible?
Here is the truth: somewhere deep inside, that creative spark is just waiting to catch fire. To reignite and burn again through something else. It has to be.
While I might be in the most difficult times personally and professionally I have ever been in – directionless, unattached and just feeling like I need a “win” so to speak – I know that this, too, is a season. I know that all things are not lost.
What can be built out of this? What I learned and accomplished at and through the doors that EVOKE (and even more so from the people that walked that journey with me) opened for me over nearly 20 years of life is worthy soil to nurture my “next.” It is more than enough, really.
Am I scared to fail? Maybe I’m scared to succeed. Either way – it is no time to stand still and time to let creativity win.
Action
Find the spark. Light it. Let it burn and change who I am so I can be better at home and for the community.
Definitely feeling this with you.
Taking photos has been a space for me to let my stalled creativity run hot. Walking through these city streets looking to grab those passing moments has been a way to both slow my mind down and stoke the creative burn.
Who knows what will come of it, the time spent camera in hand training my eye to see differently… Maybe nothing more than what it is now. Passion. Hobby? Or maybe something I can’t predict will develop. I really don’t know.
But I’m learning to live with intention in the uncertainty. Rest and reignite.