“My mind is not working in the direction of my highest good. It bogs me down with excuses, guides me to distractions. Even the incessant curiosity and highs come from juggling multiple ideas per minute, rather than sitting with one idea per hour.”

This looks like the diary of an aspiring writer.

I am here already, working through the mist of consciousness, tired of the drag of the musts and shoulds, bruised by the inauthenticity of my work in service of my dearest mission — to create and protect my family, my children, my dear ones.

I have lost myself in my preconception hour, when my soul was targeting an unhappy couple in a happy moment of oblivion, on the rarest holiday of their life abroad in Germany, in Dresden. They were not themselves then. My mother was feeling alive and fulfilled and mesmerized with the travel and the marvel of a new land, when the opportunities were wide open. And in such an auspicious moment, my soul landed in their family.

Yet the moment they were back, the old mood prevailed. Rational thought excluded the possibility of an aberration — but it had already landed. And it matured, and it was discussed, and there was a battle over it, and it stayed: unruly, unwelcome, unwanted, unneeded, and still present.

Do we mother our art the way we are mothered?

I was so inspired at the first glimpse of the possibility — of being a writer, of being authentic, of discovering myself. And then I shrank. I was shattered. I retracted. I stopped. I was paralyzed. I was afraid it might be disruptive.

My instinct was not to welcome it. Not just fear of the unknown, but of the space it was getting. I was not sure I could survive another storm of pure passion with no rationale, with no boundaries, with a drive that enslaves.

They say it is a call, and we consciously respond. But once we respond it can turn into a drive, and even into a drag. Failure can elevate the passion into a drive against all obstacles. Success can turn it into a drag against all auspicious circumstances.

And my soul can be crucified, torn between my values and survival instinct. Who would survive, and will I be the authentic being I am meant to be?

All kinds of fears and conflicting instincts at a deep level are engaged in a strife that blocks any outer expression. So I get paralyzed, stunned, stuck.

And I see one way to move on, to blast on, to keep my depth pouring out. This one way is to automate, to create a ritual, to stop thinking of inspiration, to write as karma. That is why anything good cannot survive on a whim, cannot persist as an inspiration, but only as part of a ritual, a pattern, an automated routine.

Just like water cannot be kept while streaming, the inspiration needs a holder. The protocol is the cup. The inspiration is the water. It is very hard to sip it while it flows, unless we catch it in a cup.

So I really think now: nothing was holding me back. There was no evil mind, no saboteur, no fear of failure. There was no holder where my thoughts could land and expand.

So one solution to the so-called writer’s block is just the automation of the ritual of writing. Having it at the same time every day. Observing it as a prayer, as a meditation, as karma — not attached to results. Just letting it be. That would be a solution.

It is not that I am dissociated. It is that I have not created a space for the writing.

I was worried that even if I found an identity, a niche, it would not live, as there is no space to steal from my other life. The necessities of making a living, the demands of my corporate job, will engulf all the extra time — or it might die from attrition and doom me and my family to poverty and worse. The demands of my life, or the relapses of my craving, can kill the gentle growth of a new idea, of a new practice. It is not utilitarian, and in a utilitarian world where everything justifies its existence with money, it might be hard to survive. The idea of it might have been fine and brought some dopamine while dreaming — but the practice is demanding and has no use.

It rarely brings dopamine, and to receive any I need to be showing up and available daily, queuing for inspiration, living with mediocrity. Mediocrity which is painful.

Why is this mediocrity painful? Mediocrity is painful when authenticity is the main ingredient of the work. It is really strange, that when I am authentic in my work, I am inviting my soul as a co-creator. The work itself is a prayer; the work itself is my soul’s work. So when it is mediocre, it is not authentic, it is not from spirit — it hurts, because the lack of the spirit where it is expected to be is painful.

This is like a temple deserted by the deity. Like a home which the lover has left. The one who remains is in pain, in deep pain. The instinct is to run away — but where? The only place you can expect the spirit, the lover, to come back is the temple, the home. It will not find you in strange places, in random wandering. So as painful as it may be, you are left with the mediocrity, and might need — must — endure it. Just as the lover must endure the loneliness, the bereavement, and there is no other path to go.

So putting up with one’s own mediocrity is not a betrayal. It is the most sincere act of becoming, the most sincere act of prayer in the darkness of delusion. Mediocrity is the path, as there is no other place to wait for your muse. It cannot land in the world of hopes, of dreams, of vain complacency. The muse lands in the valley of sorrow that mediocrity has excavated under the mountain top, aspiring to the top.

The mediocrity is the path, the passion, the suffering. Or is it? It is in fact not the mediocrity, but the pain from the feeling of the distance between the manifested art and the ideal in my heart. But if there is no practice, as ugly as it can be, it will never grow to feel just right, to match our authentic self, to be a true expression of who we are.

For an hour a day, I can sit with what is and compassionately accept it. A lot needs to flow before there is a coherent and transparent and pure spring of inspired word.

It is strange how my mind shuts down, gets to sleep, tries to run away. I still cannot understand it. But I can feel it still dances with fear — that the time of the drudgery might never end, the deity might never come back to the empty temple, and all of this can be a self-inflicted misery, a self-created hell.

This is a disbelief. Or a clear thought that there is no point. It would be exhausting and in vain, why bother — just nap, just eat, just forget like everybody else. This is so hard to overrun. How? How to fight against a detached and ready-to-nap mind, a runaway from heaven who has forgotten the path back. Or is this intelligence even sacred? It could be poisoned, hijacked, distorted.

When my mind is unreliable, I can install a protocol, a ritual, a routine. And this is what I decide — despite my mind, despite the doubt, the drift of thought, the pain, the mediocrity as path, the drag of passion.

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Is there a conclusion?

There is. Just do it. Just do it now. Just do it tomorrow through pain. Just do it daily, and do not expect it to be fun, to make you happy, to alleviate you of other burdens. It might be just another burden until it blossoms.

Doing it through the fear, through the resistance, through the pain of mediocrity is the path to seeing the truth, living the truth. That is why it is karma — because if I am attached, it would be painful.

It seems like one minute never passes in hell. One minute can be an eternity, when in doubt. But let it be. If it is one — when we flip it, we see it was heaven in disguise. You can rejoice in the inevitability of arriving.