Running from our demanding art

This is good. Look for the money quote, “eagerness to squander the precious time I have in running from the emotional demands that [writing/music/art] will make of me.”

People often remark that they would write, or paint, or sculpt, if only they had the time. But this is pure fantasy: the artist does whatever is necessary to arrange her life so that she will have the time to make her art. Even as I fret over juggling responsibilities to my aging mother, my disabled sister, my friends, and my art, I have to admit that it is not obligation I fear, but my distressing eagerness to squander the precious time I do have in running from the emotional demands that writing will make of me.

I may gripe about the inescapable chore of revision, of laboring over what I have written until I get it right. But in my current state, revision is less my problem than a reluctance to allow the flow of words to come in the first place.

-Kathleen Norris, Acedia & Me, p.?