Time and the procrastinator

An illuminated manuscript is a book written and decorated completely by hand. Illuminated manuscripts were among the most precious objects produced in the Middle Ages and the early Renaissance, primarily in monasteries and courts. Society's rulers--emperors, kings, dukes, cardinals, and bishops--commissioned the most splendid manuscripts. Subscribe NOW to the Getty Museum channel: http://bit.ly/gettymuseumyoutube Love art?

This video is a lovely overview of how books were made before the printing press, and it's worth the watch. The main idea I got from watching it was the expense of time in creating a single book — and they were all single books. From selecting animal skins and processing them into parchment, to the manufacture of inks and quills, to the painstaking copying of text and the final binding of the book, it all took time.

Of course, time was different back then. It wasn't "clock" time, it was "calendar" time. If there were a deadline for that book, it wouldn't be by "close of business day next week," it would be "in the spring, before St. Swithins Day." People's lives were on a different schedule; they even slept differently.

So I think there may be two points for us here.

First, of course, we live by the clock these days.  Even as I write this post, I'm planning ahead how to pick up a prescription, buy some red spray paint, mail some tambourines, get groceries, paint some road signs for the burn, prepare lunch, paint some more road signs, and maybe, just maybe, finish a letter or two and have a quiet evening by the fire pit.  Your life is no doubt similar. Where in this do we find the time to Make the Thing That Is Not?

The second point is both the upside to the situation and the answer to the preceding question: we don't have to scrape sheepskins or harvest oak galls or harden goose quills to write our book or paint our painting or craft our cocktail. At no time in history has it ever been easier for us to Make the Thing That Is Not — so the smart thing to do is to use what we know about RITUAL to create that time and space where we do the work.

Paint still has to dry, writing still has to be revised, ideas still have to be beaten into existence, but on the whole we have the better deal when it comes to time.  Don't waste it.