you've got to make room to make a mess to make a masterpiece.
Also: I released some new music today! And some exciting Rich Mullins news!
Last year, early fall, I set a goal to try writing on Substack weekly. For the most part, I kept it up. That writing actually led me into some other projects which, ironically, got me so busy I couldn’t keep writing here as often for a while.
(I’m excited to share some of those projects with you here soon.)
About a month ago, though, I started finishing some of those projects—one after another. There’s still more to do, of course. There always is. But I started to see open vistas on my calendar where I could dream about what to put there next.
Write some new songs? Fire up the podcast again? Dive into YouTube? Mail out the Kickstarter rewards that hang over my ADHD-guilt-ridden head every time I’m not in a dead sprint? (I should definitely do those.)
Everyone around me will tell you—I’m never short of a dozen new ideas. But I couldn’t get moving on any of them.
Why?
The mess.
The clutter.
It’s a little embarrassing, but it’s true.
Between working nine part-time jobs, often operating as a solo parent while Alison fights her cancer, trying to take care of the house, be a good friend, call my mom, and walk around the lake most days for my mental and physical health… well… I also tend to just throw crap in the garage and promise to deal with it later.
Then I don’t.
Every six months or so, I spend a Saturday surface-cleaning, which means that in a couple of weeks, it’s right back to how it was. The piles in the garage start to become piles in the basement, which become piles in the studio, and all of a sudden, the thought of starting something new becomes paralyzing.
There’s no place to do it. No room to breathe.
I can tend to make a bit of a mess while I’m in the middle of creativity, but that’s not at all the same as trying to start being creative in the middle of a mess.
Sometimes, the best way to do the thing you want to do isn’t by doing the thing you want to do — it’s by doing the thing you need to do first.
Taking a couple of days off each week for the past few weeks to deep-clean the garage, reorganize the studio, and work on the yard… it’s given me room to finally enter into my deeper work.
Along the way, it’s also given me time to think, to remember old ideas, to make connections, to find the other projects I started but abandoned…
Have I been productive? I don’t know. It would’ve been hard to justify my last couple of weeks back in my 9-to-5 days, but I’m grateful not to be living those days right now.
A little mental headspace (and physical floor and desk space) feels mighty productive now that I’m sitting down to do the work I’m anxious to do.
This is dangerous territory, I’ll admit—because I’m also a procrastinator. There might be a part of this cleaning that’s avoiding the fact that I’m a little scared of the next work I’m setting out to do.
There are parts of what’s ahead that I haven’t done before. I have to face the blank page. Ask for help. I need to learn new things, and I’ll surely fail at them for a while first. Maybe for a long time.
But even if it is procrastination, I’ve been a creative professional long enough to know that procrastination has paid off a little too often to totally write it off as a bad thing.😬
(And that’s terrible advice, though it’s true.)
I’ve probably got a Saturday’s worth of work left to do still, but I’m close enough now that I’m starting to feel like you do at the end of a vacation—where you’re kind of ready to head home and get back to work.
I’ve got stuff to do. Mountains to climb.
I’m glad I’ll have this clean little room to do it in.
No excuses now.
Here we go.
I also have a few really fun things to share with you today.
New Music!
First up — I just released the lead single from my upcoming album!
The album is called Hold The Light, and it’s just live acoustic guitar/vocal versions of some of my favorite songs from my career so far.
I actually released the album on vinyl late last year, which you can still get [HERE]. But the first two songs are out streaming today.
All the singles from this record will be double singles. Today’s are:
“After The Last Tear Falls” & “I’ll Be Home Soon”
I wrote “After The Last Tear Falls” right after I got married 22 years ago and showed it to my new friend Andrew Peterson. He was looking for one more song for his record at the time and asked if he could record it—also if he could rewrite the chorus. I loved what his new chorus added to the song, and this became the first of many collaborations we’ve had over the years.
He’s been playing this song for two decades now, and I’m so glad to finally get to have a version of it myself.
The other song, “I’ll Be Home Soon,” is probably my favorite song from my old band, The Normals. It was from our last record, when I was homesick making an album in upstate New York and just wanted to be back in Nashville with the girl I was falling in love with and the friends I missed.
There’s a longing in this song, too, for a home that a pilgrim in this life will always be homesick for. In that way, the song feels more and more relevant to me with each passing year—each passing day.
It’s probably also my favorite acoustic guitar part I’ve ever written.
The videos will be released publicly in two weeks, but just for you guys, here’s a private link to “After The Last Tear Falls.”
A Liturgy, A Legacy, & One Night at the Ryman
The last piece of news also involves more collaborations and my friend Andrew Peterson. Eight years ago, a group of us—led by Andrew—gathered to pay tribute to one of our songwriting heroes, Rich Mullins.
This event was honestly a Top Five musical moment of my life. To a sold-out Ryman Auditorium crowd, for one night only, we played a live note-for-note version of Rich’s greatest album, A Liturgy, A Legacy & A Ragamuffin Band. We began the night with about a dozen other Rich songs, as well.
I’ve never practiced harder for one show in my life.
There was no video, and this was never repeated. But a couple of years ago, our amazing sound guy—and another dear, dear friend—Harold, realized that he had recorded the files on a hard drive. Ben Shive started cleaning them up, and now there’s a Kickstarter to release the album as a 3-disc vinyl.
You can get an early download of the album or the vinyl. No other rewards. I love it. I’ve heard the album and it brought me to tears.
After my major studio clean, I took down most of my old show posters, gold records, and things and tried to make the place nice and clean. But I did keep the poster of that night hanging up. I don’t ever want to forget it. I’m so glad we get to invite people to relive it with us.
Ok, that’s it for me today.
Thanks for listening to my new songs and supporting the Rich Mullins kickstarter.
Pick a little corner and clean it up. I hope it helps you like it has me.
Finally, here are some Scriptures for those of you want to join me in prayer for our nation, its leaders, and the things we’re seeing in the news these days.
“This is what the LORD says: Do what is just and right. Rescue from the hand of the oppressor the one who has been robbed. Do not wrong or violence to the foreigner, the fatherless, or the widow.” – Jeremiah 22:3
“Speak up for those who cannot speak for themselves, for the rights of all who are destitute. Speak up and judge fairly; defend the rights of the poor and needy.” – Proverbs 31:8-9
“The foreigner residing among you must be treated as your native-born. Love them as yourself, for you were foreigners in Egypt. I am the LORD your God.” – Leviticus 19:34
“There is neither Jew nor Gentile, neither slave nor free, nor is there male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus.” – Galatians 3:28
“Learn to do right; seek justice. Defend the oppressed. Take up the cause of the fatherless; plead the case of the widow.” – Isaiah 1:17
“The righteous care about justice for the poor, but the wicked have no such concern.” – Proverbs 29:7
“For God has not given us a spirit of fear, but of power, love, and self-discipline.” – 2 Timothy 1:7
“Do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God’s will is—his good, pleasing and perfect will.” – Romans 12:2
After the last tear falls, there is love.
Peace to you.
My friend Andy likes to say, “you'll never be good at something unless you're willing to be terrible at it first.”
I have spent around the last 1.5 years deep studying any writing I can find on rich. That record would be a dream