The map of your effects

This is Western Coffee—notes on building the creative body. Last time: What if I’m wrong? The whole series is here. Please share this email; you can sign up free below.

This newsletter is an argument for the more active use of creative imagination, by everyone. And yeah, I do think you would make the most beautiful rope art if you cut back your hours at the law office. But that’s not my reason.

My reason is, you and I and everyone else can sense that many of our actions have less impact on the reality we live in than we’d like. Our autonomy starts out fairly weak at the center, with regard to time and money and relationships, and loses force as the range expands. I wrote in November about the paradox of an election, that many of us invest it with the greatest importance despite the deep inconsequence of our own role. That is true whether or not the voting result is to your liking; in fact, it might be a bit worse if you won, because that briefly redeems the illusion of control.

What cultivating the strength and endurance of your body does; what holding yourself to a daily writing practice even when you don’t want to, even when what you’re writing is shitty, even when you’re too busy and stressed and uninspired, does; what working your way dish by dish through that new cookbook does; what searching for the right way, for you, to meditate does; what having the hardest conversations with your partner does; what building any habit that leaves the world with something it didn’t have before does—is restore your relationship to your choice. And it starts to render faithful the map of your effects.

If we leave ourselves content to consume and react, then someone will maneuver their way to the top and take everything. Because you know what? That person is in touch with their creative force. Standing beside the categories of true and false on the civilizational stage is the one that really matters for all moments after this one, that of the possible. People who summon movements understand this. But you and I can, too. We create small things because there’s joy in it. But we also create small things because that’s the way to start.

Kindly send me your thoughts, questions, and provocations: dmichaelowen@gmail.com.