Yeah But What Does Leonard Cohen Think?
“If I knew where inspiration came from, I would go there more often.”
-Leonard Cohen
I’ve been thinking about this quote lately, and about how difficult and insane it is to be an artist, to do the practice of being an artist. I remember listening to an interview with Phoebe Bridgers where she talked about how she feels like she didn’t really write any of her songs, that she feels like she blacks out, goes into a fugue state, and then comes out again having no idea how she got there.
And all she has left is the evidence of being in this different state – the song itself! I love that.
It takes a tremendous amount of openness and trust in the universe to be a songwriter. And persistence. I’ve written a bunch of songs I’m really proud of, and still, actually just last night, I was sitting at the piano and there was nothing happening. My emotions were a tangle, a mystery, something to be avoided if I’m being completely honest, and all of the chords and melodies and lyrics were boring and tedious and over-familiar.
And then I’m going to look this failure in the face and try again today.
Because it’s this going to the well over and over that is the only way to get the water. Sit down, try to write a song, fail, try not to get lost in a story of what a horrible fraud/loser/failure you are (this one is tough for me!), repeat the next day.
There is a part of me that thinks it is unbelievable that this is the only way. Can’t I somehow avoid this tedium and unpredictability and endless facing of endless failures — and just get to the good shit?
It takes a hardy soul and a patient mind to keep going back to a well that seems empty, that looks and feels and smells empty.
This well hasn’t seen water in 8000 years, says a gravely cowboy voice. He’s looking down too into this well that sits in the middle of the desert. He looks at me. A dusty wind blows.
Maybe it’s time to give up, his lined face says.
And yet, Mr. Cowboy, if I may be so bold, I am afraid that this is the only way.
What a drag and an amazing thing to have so little control over the outcome! In order to keep trying we have to hold such a deep feeling of faith that inspiration will come again.
So in that sense I guess despite what Leonard Cohen says above, we do and don’t know where inspiration comes from. We don’t know when it will come (will it be in 10 minutes? 10 weeks?) or in what form it will come (will it be a song about typewriters, loneliness, card games?), but we do know that it is only through consistently trying that the spirits of songs will want to come and speak through us. I think they’re always looking for a safe bet, you know what I mean? They’re like, oh, ok, they look like they have some follow-thru. They’ll do. Let the water flow!
