Several years ago, I read an amazing book. This doesn't happen very often. Maybe I am too picky when it comes to reading. If you are a musician, or any kind of a writer/creator for that matter, "Effortless Mastery" by K. Werner is one title you should study.

Here is the reason I have been thinking about it lately. When I wrote music, the process always turned addictive. The more I sat at the piano, in darkness, with only my fingers searching for a trace of a new melody beneath the keys, the less I wanted to do anything but. The music stalked me wherever I went, in dreams, during conversations with friends, at most inappropriate moments. 

Once, during a long drive home, I heard a song on the radio. The composition, entirely orchestral, was so surreal, so perfect, that I had to turn the volume all the way up. Well, at least I tried. It would have worked much better had the radio been on in the first place.The song existed only inside my head. I had to pull over and write down what I could, but being a mere mortal a.k.a. not Mozart, I lost the melody. Most of it escaped before pen touched napkin.

I loved composing, I still do, but when I attended to that love too much, the result was a case of creative insomnia. It drowned me to the point at which I wondered if that's why so many artists were just plain crazy.

I feel the same about literary writing. In fact, that's the reason for this rant. A desire to just write something, no matter how bad. I want it to leave me alone, but maybe I shouldn't struggle so much.

What about the book, you ask? What does it have to do with anything you're saying? I will tell you. In it, Werner talks about a unified creative source, an energy that surges through universe like an underground river. This energy is everlasting. As artists, all we do is tap into it, then paint a masterpiece or write a love poem or an awesome magazine article. When you decide to open to it on regular basis,the power can become overwhelming. Weird, I think. But also reassuring. It means that no matter the kinds of lifepaths we settle on, despite the everyday traps which shape us into old, sarcastic, depressed, overused, non-productive beasts, the light remains on. A Fountain of Youth, kind of. A curse and a blessing.

And, of course, a perfect explanation why I am at this computer on a Saturday night, instead of out in some funky Vegas night club practicing my non-existing dance skills. That reminds me. If anybody knows of a dancing energy source, I would like the directions to it please. Something has to be done about my total lack of a sense of rhythm when I do my Pussycat Dolls routine!