Fast & Slow
Present Sense № 11
Welcome to Present Sense – a weekend curation for Paid Subscribers – with 7 sensory recommendations: something to SEE, HEAR, SMELL, TASTE, TOUCH, BALANCE and ENVISION. Each week also includes an audio guided meditation.
When do we lean towards our innate talents? And when do we push ourselves outside our comfort zones?
My natural tendencies gear towards the slow, intentional, and meaningful. Whether I’m writing, curating or making art, I strive for beauty, quality, and depth. I tend to equate those qualities with time, effort and attention to detail.
This set of beliefs is reflected in my process, which is diligent, precise, and conscientious. I take several weeks to research the monthly themes I explore in Seven Senses. Every essay goes through many rounds of revisions and edits. I approach visual art in a similar way: I’ve just completed an illustrated book, which I worked on for three years.
I’ve recently been challenging my creative inclinations, with the help of my dear friend Nanou, who was recently visiting me from Paris. During our rainy vacation in Northern California, we spent many evenings drawing and painting by the fire. My friend noticed the care and attention I put into each of my creations – and the ways in which it could sometimes contrive, restrain and limit me. As a professional artist who had trained at the Beaux Arts, she had plenty of creative tricks to share.
To shake-off my habitual creative approach, she walked me through a few creative prompts. We started with some live-model drawings: my friend would strike various poses and I had 30 seconds to draw each one. Then, she selected random objects in the house and I had up to three minutes to either draw or paint them. “See! Now it’s alive! It has personality!,” she would point out once I completed each exercise. And I have to admit, she was right. When I stopped trying to make my drawings look beautiful, they suddenly became more interesting. Less time meant less thinking – which led to more intuitive results.
There was something liberating about breaking the mold of my pre-conceived notion of beauty. It was humbling to admit that something that took a minute to create could be more impactful than something that demanded hours.
It would be an oversimplification to say that speed leads to quality. As my friend pointed out, the work I do often benefits from a slow, attentive, and meticulous approach. But those natural qualities can also restrict, rather than expand my creative potential.
Creative solutions never sit at the extremes but often sway between polarities, seeking a middle ground. It’s less about fully changing our natural predispositions, but becoming aware when the pendulum has swung too far. Creativity is that constant balancing act.
I’ll be exploring themes of creative balance with
from Creative Fuel in a creative workshop series on Zoom, for paid subscribers. Details below to signup.This week’s 7 sensory suggestions includes: an astonishing memoir, my latest sonic obsession, an easy dessert recipe, a guided meditation and a creative prompt.
In Joy,
Sabrina
WORKSHOP SERIES: The Harmony of Opposites