Creative\\Reviews: A Look Back at 2021, and a Hope for 2022

Vol. 3, No. 1

Jan 05, 2022

Welcome to Creative\\Proofing, a space for hopeful, creative people learning to live wisely by asking questions about the good life: what it is, how to design our own, and how to live it well.
This newsletter is built on the hope of reciprocal generosity: I want to share what I find beautiful and meaningful, and I'd love for you to do the same. If you're inspired by anything I share, it would mean so much if you shared it with others, subscribed, dropped me a line and let me know, or paid according to the value it has for you. No matter what, I hope we can create and learn together.

Ask Me Anything

Since I’ve spent a full year building systems and tracking data in my Notion workspace, I’m actually able to effectively review what happened in the last twelve months, what I thought and felt, and what it meant to me. I like being able to collect data, develop information, and uncover meaning, because really, what else is Notion for?

Best Reads

In 2021, I renewed my practice of reading from actual books, not just digital versions. Over the last few months, I’ve developed a morning routine of reading a chapter or two with my coffee, and before practicing meditation. It’s a lovely way to slowly wake up and focus on my heart and soul before taking on the day. I tend to read either spirituality or fiction in the morning, simply because I’m not a morning person and anything that requires holding facts in a logical sequence that early in the day is simply beyond me.

I track mostly non-fiction in my Notion media database (primarily books, articles, and podcasts), so while I know I’ve engaged over 200 pieces of media this year, I also think I’ve read around another 100 works of fiction, borrowed through my local library’s digital service. So, I’ve taken in a lot this year!! Here’s some of the highlights, the things that either transformed how I see the world or myself, or that I thought had something really interesting to say.

In curating this list, I notice a key theme is that of personal formation: how does one become the best person possible? How do I both desire and discern what the good life is, and then, how I do I behave in such a way as to live into that good life? How do I help myself behave in such a way consistently? In their own way, each of these authors helped me articulate those questions, and also to discern my answers for living the good life in this time and place, strange and chaotic though it be.

Best Poems

I started life as a poet, and what with one thing and another, have renewed my befriending that old self in new guise this year. I’ve revisited old friends, and discovered new ones in 2021, and though the list be small, it be mighty in impact.

The Untamed, R.S. Thomas
Book of Hours: Love Poems to God, Rainer Maria Rilke

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Best Art

Daniel Grissom, a world that eats its children

scottthepainter

A post shared by Scott Erickson (@scottthepainter)

Best Sounds

I’m always on the lookout for new, and good, music, but I tend to rely on others to point me in the right direction. I’m a big blues fan these days, so The Arcs and The Black Keys were favorite buys this year. I also love weird music, so Heilung, an experimental folk band (emphasis on experimental) featured heavily on my Spotify rotations. I mean, if you don’t feel like running naked through the woods and holding a still-beating heart up to the moon after listening to this band, are you even alive?

Best Views

I tend to get bored easily with tv shows and movies, and going to the theatre felt like a chore even before The Current Unpleasantness. That said, here’s the standouts of the year (that I watched, though most came out in 2021). When a show or movie really lingers in my heart and mind for days afterward, that’s when I know it was really something. And I mean...BABY YODA.

Best Experiences

What with working from home, and various lock-downs, restrictions, and apocalypses (apocalypsii?), I didn’t venture too far afield and instead, ventured inward. I started quite a few things this year, and I plan to continue cultivating these seeds into 2022.

Zentangles
Meditation
Counseling
Intentional retreat days
Creative\\Proofing (this newsletter)
Managing to accomplish some small, but significant, personal projects, even with taking a new, larger role at my day job

Best Writings

I started life as a poet and a writer, so writing has always been A Thing. That said, I’m rediscovering what it means to be a writer now, with the life I’ve had so far, and the life I’m building from here. Since I did start publishing consistently online this year, here’s a few things I really enjoyed working on.

2021 was a strange, and a strangely normal, year, proving that you can get used to almost anything. I found it a year of building: of systems, habits, relationships, visions, desires, plans. In short, I found myself building the scaffolding for the life I want, the person I want and long to become. As I take the next steps into 2022, I really want to focus on cultivating: coaxing tendrils of life to climb up the scaffolding I’ve prepared thus far into luscious, vibrant blossoms, leaves, and vines that flourish, not just for me, but for others, including you, dear reader.

So expect more issues of Creative\\Proofing, and hopefully, even more creative\\ways for us to collaborate and grow in the next twelve months.

Let’s be creative, hopeful, and wise — together.

Shalom,
Megan.