Part 1. The Blinking Line
Alan Watts quote is from the Tao of Philosophy.
. . . if I was going to write a book, I was going to have to actually write a book. That book is called Velvet Elvis.
Christopher Moore’s book. It’s called Lamb: The Gospel According to Biff, Christ’s Childhood Pal, and it’s brilliant.
Annie Dillard. The line is from Teaching a Stone to Talk: Expeditions and Encounters: “What is the difference between a cathedral and a physics lab? Are not they both saying: Hello?”
Dorothy Sayers’s words about Trinitarian creativity are found in her book The Mind of the Maker.
Dave Eggers. Please tell me you’ve read something by Dave Eggers. I’d start with What Is the What. Or maybe The Circle. Or probably you should begin with his first book, A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius.
This poem, by the way, is the first chapter of the Bible. For a fascinating perspective on Genesis 1, see Charles Foster’s book The Selfless Gene: Living with God and Darwin.
My friend Carlton. Carlton Cuse wrote and produced the shows Lost and Bates Motel and The Strain and Nash Bridges and Colony.
Jesus taught his disciples a prayer. The prayer is in the Gospel of Matthew, chapter 6.
Boredom. For insight into the relationship between creation and boredom, see Cornelius Plantinga’s book Engaging God’s World: A Christian Vision of Faith, Learning, and Living.
Part 2. The Blank Page
Stephen King quote is from On Writing.
I once had an idea for a book called Fire in the Wine. That book eventually became What We Talk About When We Talk About God. I first came across that line about the fire in the wine in Frederick Bauerschmidt’s book Why the Mystics Matter Now. The line is from St. Ephraim the Syrian:
. . . in your Bread is hidden a Spirit not to be eaten, In your Wine dwells a Fire not be drunk . . .
Like a tape that’s jammed on “repeat.” For more on the tapes that play in our heads, see my RobCast Episode 7, “Changing the Tapes,” at robbell.com.
What is that to you? The story about Jesus and Peter is in the Gospel of John, chapter 21.
. . . the movie Comedian. After Jerry Seinfeld finished making his show Seinfeld, he surprised audiences by going onstage late at night in comedy clubs, trying out new material. A camera crew followed him as he created an entirely new act.
Bruce Springsteen. One of the best books about Bruce Springsteen is Peter Ames Carlin’s book Bruce.
“You” hasn’t been attempted before. Elizabeth Gilbert writes about this in her marvelous book Big Magic: Creative Living Beyond Fear.
Who am’n’t I? There’s actually a song by the band Mogwai called “Moses? I Amn’t.” As you can see, they spell it differently.
Part 3. The Japanese Have a Word for It
Kanye West quote is from Twitter.
. . . we make our way in the world by the sweat of our brow. See Genesis 3:19.
. . . we’re all a piece of work. That’s a reference to a line in the letter to the Ephesians (chapter 2) in the New Testament where the Apostle Paul writes, “We’re all God’s handiwork.”
Part 4. The Thing About Craft
Carlton Cuse quote is from variety.com’s October 27, 2015, article “For Carlton Cuse, Collaboration Is the Key to Creativity” by Debra Birnbaum.
I once had an idea for a tour. That tour was in 2006 and it was called “Everything Is Spiritual.” We made a film of it that you can get at robbell.com.
Scottish schoolmaster. Edwin Abbott is his name, and the book is called Flatland.
. . . my friend Zach. Zach is the drummer in Jimmy Eat World. You’re a fan, right? If you aren’t, I recommend starting with the Futures album.
Part 5. The First Number
Tony Iommi quote is from Iron Man.
I once had an idea for a novel. The book is called Millones Cajones and you can get it at robbell.com.
Eddie. Eddie started a company that makes a product called Kung Fu Tonic. Google it. Or go to kungfutonic on Instagram to see that legendary Eddie smile.
I once had an idea for a short film. We made twenty-four of those short films; they’re called Noomas.
Part 6. The Dickie Factor
Rumi quote is from Rumi: The Big Red Book.
. . . where the waters run deep. See Proverbs 20:5.
Part 7. The Two Things You Always Do
Chris Martin quote is from “A Look at the ‘Mystery’ of Coldplay,” 60 Minutes.
You first talk to whoever will listen. I once had an idea for a sermon that involved lots of large exercise balls. It struck me how in the Genesis poem that begins the Bible, the light that comes from the sun and stars is something different from the divine light that emanates from God and guides us into authentic living. You can be in a very dark room but living in the light, and you can be in a well-lit room and yet still be in the dark.
Or something like that.
I found this insight terribly thrilling and decided to build a sermon around it. The room I was preaching in had the stage in the middle and the seats in a series of concentric circles around it. We fastened hooks to the ceiling and I began the sermon by handing out giant exercise balls that represented the different planets and then I asked people to stand on their chairs and attach them to the hooks. I had the balls placed in such a way that the room became a model of the solar system. Then we dimmed the lights and played “Stayin’ Alive” from the Saturday Night Fever soundtrack while a disco ball was lowered down from the ceiling that represented—you guessed it—the sun.
At this point you might be wondering, You began a sermon by building a model of the solar system using exercise balls and a disco ball . . . what kind of sermon was this?
If you are wondering that, you, my friend, are asking an excellent question.
From there I talked about light and transparency and honesty and then I brought the whole thing to what I was convinced would be a compelling crescendo about telling the truth and refusing to live in the dark. I had the lights dimmed around the perimeter of the room so that only the center was full of bright light to illustrate my point . . . my point that no one seemed to get.
I was so convinced that by the end there would be—
I don’t know, actually, what I was expecting.
Have you experienced this? You’re let down because something you’d been working toward didn’t turn out how you wanted it to, but when you reflect on what exactly it was that you were expecting would happen, you can’t really articulate it.
I remember finishing the sermon and it was so quiet. And a room with thousands of quiet people in it is . . . quiet. It’s a loud kind of quiet. Not the good kind of quiet that comes from deep introspection and meditation and thoughtfulness.
The other kind of quiet. Like the air had been sucked out of the room.
I call it crickets quiet.
I had such high hopes for that sermon, and afterward I don’t think one person said anything about it.
I bombed,
and I knew it.
You may be true to your ikigai, giving it everything you have, throwing yourself into your work and your path with everything you’ve got and it may go really well.
Or it may not.
People may sign up, buy, listen, learn, invest, read, register, get involved—or they may not. People may get it. Or they may not.
They may be moved and inspired and compelled, or they may turn to the people next to them when it’s done and say, Where do you want to go for lunch?
You do not want to leave me too. John 6:66–67.
Aren’t we right? John 8:48.
Are you betraying me? Luke 22:48.
. . . some doubted. Matthew 28:17.
Peter-the-caffeinated-disciple protests, No never! Matthew 16:22.
Part 8. The Power of the Plates
Robert Irwin quote is from Seeing Is Forgetting the Name of the Thing One Sees.
. . . how you do anything is how you do everything. My friend Dan Klyn said this.
. . . just in case you might need them someday. I interviewed The Minimalists for RobCast Episode 15 and they shared an incredibly helpful idea involving the things we keep around just in case. You can listen at robbell.com.
Rhythm. For more on this, see RobCast Episode 23, “The Cellular Exodus,” at robbell.com.
. . . this one day that is not like the others is called the Sabbath. The best book on the Sabbath is The Sabbath: Its Meaning for Modern Man (1951) by Abraham Joshua Heschel.
Part 9. The Exploding Burrito
Abraham Joshua Heschel quote is from God in Search of Man.
. . . how to be fully present in this moment. My friend Richard Rohr has a mantra he repeats often: Just this.
When you find yourself overwhelmed with all that is coming at you, take a deep breath and say to yourself,
Just this.
Just this conversation, just this 1, just this moment. You’re building muscle, learning to focus on the 1 in any situation.
My friend Pete Holmes often asks,
What is lacking in this moment?
Because the answer is usually “nothing.” When you stress that you’re missing out, that something terrible and ominous is coming your way because of something you did or didn’t do, when you’re anxious about some upcoming event, stop. Breathe. Ask yourself,
What is lacking in this moment?
Look around you. Remember that the first word about you is gift. Some things you can control, some you can’t. Do the next right thing, surrender the rest.
I often ask myself,
What is the next right thing?
Because that’s all you can do. The next right thing. You cannot do it all. You can only do the next right thing in front of you.
You doing a few things well is a thousand times better than you doing lots and lots of things with half a heart because you’re rushing from thing to thing.