Some Things Meaningful-Creating

This is mostly an essay. It's not meant to be a self-help truth. It isn't supposed to be a complete thought on the meaning of life by any means, as if I were capable of such a thing. It's mostly my attempt to verbalize into immortalization a few realizations that have been part of my maturation process. Wordy right? I like it. I'm no writer. You get it as it comes out of my head.

I have been struggling lately. My wife and I moved about 7 months ago and she is struggling with the job thing and we're in a pretty small apartment which creates problems for me because I'm not a clean freak (I'm not really afraid of germs and eating "safe" food), but I'm a tidy freak. Also I have a lot of hobbies. Probably better put as I would like to enjoy doing many different things. I like painting which can take up a bunch of space and be a big mess. I have a recent fascination with electromagnetics that has inspired me to make my own wind generator, I like to cook, I consider myself a musician, but I rarely am paid to do make music. I did some theater and speech in high school. I have been running lately and I love riding my bike.

Since we have moved, it has been difficult to get myself motivated to do any of these things that I love to do. I guess you could say we're in a rut. It's almost to the point that I/we feel like we need to be the person that we were when we were doing well, the musician, the artist, the baseball player or what-have-you. The problem is that we are in different situations that maybe don't allow us to be that person that we once were.

With that, I was making pizza the other night and I got to thinking,"wow, this feels good". I was really enjoying working with my hands using the tools that I had to make pizza. The best part is that I had complete control over what the pizza would eventually taste like. I got to add as much basil, oregano and cheese as I wanted. It was sort of relaxing. I even used probably the biggest clove of garlic that I have ever seen.

It just felt good creating. I got to thinking some more about the things that I have been trying to do more that have been part of my life that made me feel good: music, art and writing. I realized that these were all the same principle, they were are creating. I had explored creating art in high school, I became quite good at creating music in college, and now that I'm married and out of college out on my own with my wife, I am in a different place and am now capable of exploring creating food.

I found it pretty satisfying that when I was making the pizza I was using all of my senses while making it. I kneaded the dough until it felt right, I tasted the sauce until it tasted right, and I smelled the blend of garlic and spices in the sauce, I heard the cheese melting when I would sneak a peak, and it was all very visually stimulating when I took it out of the oven. The brown and white cheese, red sauce, red pepperoni and golden crust.

Other people may have their own thing that they like to do, but I think that my thing that I need to do to feel good is create and be creative among other things obviously.

I don't know that all of the things that I've spoken of here would have been nearly as satisfying if I wouldn't have had anybody to share these things with. I think that part of the experience is having somebody enjoy or show appreciation for what you have done.

So with that, there are going to be follow up posts on these topics and the implications they may have on my life as a Christian.

1. Creating
2. Having somebody enjoy or show appreciation for a creation.
3. The ability of one to show appreciation to others, especially loved ones based on the idea that not everybody has loved ones.
4. You don't NEED nice things, but you have to be able to appreciate and be thankful for the things that you have.