Sacrificing for Art: A Fine Balance

"This most of all: ask yourself in the most silent hour of your night: must I write? Dig into yourself for a deep answer. And if this answer rings out in assent, if you meet this solemn question with a strong, simple "I must," then build your life in accordance with this necessity; your whole life, even into its humblest and most indifferent hour, must become a sign and witness to this impulse." ~Ranier Maria Rilke~ Letters to a Young Poet

My poetry teacher quoted from this passage during our final poetry writing workshop yesterday. It really struck a chord in me. He said that he knows plenty of poets who have miserable personal lives due to focusing solely on their craft, and also those who lead rich multifaceted lives built around writing. Sometimes I wonder which camp I belong to. On some levels I think I need to find more balance. I am willing to sacrifice almost anything to continue my education, largely to learn all I can about the craft of writing.
Would I really live in a cardboard box, as I told my husband earlier in the week, to pursue my art? I would never want to give up my marriage for my art. That is one thing that is too sacred for me to compromise. He is so supportive that it has never hampered our relationship that I'm aware of. He is my ideal reader, and my best editor. It is amazing how much he has learned about poetry and what his feedback has done for my work. He is like a Muse to me. So in that area of my life, I have a solid foundation for my art, not to mention my sanity, in a supportive partner. He goes above and beyond support into helping hone my art. He lets me read draft after draft aloud to him, which is an important part of my process. He tells me when something is unclear, sentimental, or far fetched. He brings me food when I have been in a creative whirlwind and haven't stopped to fix anything. He puts up with dust gathering on the bookshelves because I have been too immersed to stop and do my share of the cleaning. Sometimes he even knocks the dust off of the shelves himself. He is a wonderfully intelligent, caring, and patient man.
However, my social life is another story. My social life has taken a hit. This deficit isn't helped by my social awkwardness, but I rarely pry myself away from my work to go out or socialize. I keep up with people on FaceBook, the occasional meal, or a phone call. But how often do I go out and do things? Not very often. Part of this stems from my drive to create, and to do my schoolwork well so that I can pursue competitive MFA programs. Part of it has its source in my lack of funds. Going to school full time limits my availability to work, so I only work part time.
My financial life has also taken a hit. But I refuse to "take a year off" i.e. drop out of college. I have one year left, and I will finish and go on to graduate school. Come hell or high water. Some people don't recognize my focus or determination, or seem to realize that I have been working towards this goal for almost 5 years. I was the first person in my family (on my mother's side) and the first person in my immediate family to get a college degree when I got my AA (which is only useful if you continue on and get your BA). It is remarkable when you consider that up until that point I had a ninth grade education and a tumultuous past. Some people fail to respect the hard work I have done, and what it means to me to finish what I started and pursue an even higher level of education.
I suppose that therein lies the alienation from some people which daily grows the longer I view myself as an artist, a poet. I am willing to sacrifice. I don't need support, or the support that I do need I receive from my fabulous husband. Even if he had a complete turn around and was no longer supportive I would simply carry on with my work. It is work. So many people act as if education and art are the slack and easy ways to avoid working. Being an artist is not easy, writing poetry is hard. IT is work. It IS work. It is WORK.
I love my work. It isn't much different from building a house, besides its lack of physical exertion.
This leads me to my third area of imbalance. My physical health is not so great. I lead a very sedentary life. I need to go on long walks in nature, or even on a treadmill. Some exercise, fresh air, and eating well could help me lose weight, think better, and have better health all around. In some ways this would serve my craft because I would have less stress and more solitude to rest my brain.
In the dark of night, when I ask myself if I have to write in order to survive, my answer is "Yes, I must." There have been stretches of time when I did not write, and I didn't truly feel alive. Yes, I have built the structure of my life to suit this need. I have a drive to push myself rigorously through the educational system as a part of my process. There are some things I need to work on: going out and doing stuff, working more, taking better care of my health which, sadly, hasn't been enough of a priority, dusting my bookshelves, and taking the time to tend to mundane tasks as well.
I don't want to lead a miserable personal life for the sake of art. In fact, that could lead to some pretty bad poetry. I want to strike a balance, and I think I know what I am willing to sacrifice and what I am not willing to sacrifice; the areas where I need to care for myself and others, and the pieces of solitude necessary for my craft. I am going to pursue a balance of these things over the summer. A mix of everyday work (for $), play, self care, and then the real work that I do; the process which drives the blood through my veins: writing.

You May Say I'm a Dreamer

I am a dreamer. This can be an amazing thing because many times I've had a dream and then it came true. Sometimes serendipidity had something to do with it, mostly it was sheer force of will. It didn't always last "forever," but part of being a grown up is realizing that nothing is permanent. I have had some pretty low points in my life, but I have never stopped dreaming. I've always gotten back up, survived, and sworn I would thrive. I owe a lot of this perseverance to my husband. He's taught me so much about optimism and is such a rock of strength for me. He's helped me get back off of the ground so many times. I've watched him resurrect himself from some pretty dark spaces too.
But being a dreamer is also at the core of who I am. It is in the connective tissue of my being.
Here are some things that I've dreamt of that have manifested: Meeting my husband (whose qualities I listed in a journal weeks before we met), travelling the US with him (we've traveled the US twice 62,000 miles and 10 solid months altogether), moving to Asheville, owning a business, buying and decorating a home (which we did sell, but it was still a dream lived out), being the first one in my family to get a college degree, reading my poetry at poetry readings and having it published (albeit in small school publications, but it is still gratifying to see your words in print), being well again after so much sickness, seeing my husband well after so many years of a mysterious illness, and many more small moments which have felt like dreams.
I still have so many things that I dream of doing. Here are some of them: getting the scholarship I applied for, finishing my BA with distinction, blowing the GRE out of the water, getting accepted to one of the many MFA programs on my list, getting my MFA in creative writing, publishing a collection of poems, publishing a novel, publishing creative non-fiction, getting a job as an editor, living near the ocean again, living in New York City, moving back to the mountains, buying and decorating another home, having land and a German Shepherd, getting healthy and in shape again, and growing old with my husband.
Yesterday one of my dreams came true. I got accepted into NYU's summer writer's program. I was so excited and in a state of disbelief. For some reason I think, well I hope, that $10,000 and a place to stay will fall into my lap. Even if I cannot actually go, getting accepted is one dream that I accomplished, and it motivates me to apply for the MFA at NYU later on. A place where poets like Sharon Olds and Yusef Komunyakaa teach. I can still see myself wandering Greenwich village with my ten pound laptop, searching for a bench where I can sit and write poetry for that evening's class, I can imagine myself at the historic Lillian Vernon townhouse listening to a brilliant student from some unremarkable place like Omaha (no offense Omahaians) read from their work, I can see myself at a slam poetry reading in Manhattan surrounded by new friends I met at NYU. So maybe it WILL happen, but even if it doesn't I can still mark one off of my list. I did get in, and I am still a dreamer so there's always tomorrow.