Learning to Make Messy Art

I was talking recently with a friend of mine who writes music. She is at the beginning of her career and will soon release her first album. She is brave, endlessly curious, and, like all artists starting out, occasionally terrified. We were discussing an episode of Jay Shetty’s podcast where he interviews the writer, Amie McNee. The topic was how we need to reconnect with the artist inside us and, more importantly, how to give ourselves permission to make messy art.

My friend loved this idea. She wants to be wildly experimental, to try things that might not work, to create without worrying whether the results are perfect. She is fortunate in that she has a mentor who guides her and a small circle of fellow musicians who she can exchange ideas and criticism with kindness. It is the kind of creative network I admire deeply, one built on trust rather than ego.

Our talk stayed with me, partly because I am also standing at the beginning of something. Not a music album, but a book. Old Lady at Sea is the working title. I have been circling around it for the last weeks, gathering fragments and reflections, and trying not to panic at how much I do not yet know. I have support from wonderful people who would help me in a heartbeat, but I am hesitant to take up their time until I have produced something worth showing. It is the classic creative trap: waiting for the work to become good before daring to let it be seen.

In January, I’m taking a ten-day course offered by Alison Jones on how to create a book proposal. Until then, I am sifting through everything I already have: the blog posts and podcasts from my voyage on the MV Roland Oldendorff, earlier pieces about sailing, and a large stack of daily reflections I recorded for my family while at sea. Those reflections were never published because they were just that, raw and unfiltered, full of meandering thoughts. But now I see they might contain the heartbeat of the book.

For weeks, I have been sorting through these pieces much as one might clean out a beloved attic. Some things are clearly useful. Others are dusty, sentimental, or slightly embarrassing. But together they form a record of how I saw the world at that time, and that, I suspect, is where the book will live: somewhere between travel diary and inner journey, between observation and confession, exploring even the difficult parts.

Amie McNee’s words about the creative process stays with me: getting comfortable with discomfort and seeing through new eyes even when it unsettles you. It makes me think that the book I am trying to write should not aim for tidiness or perfection. It should hold the contradictions, the unpolished bits, the moments that feel awkward or unresolved. That is the real story of any journey, whether at sea or on land.

Lately, I have been reading a lot of creative nonfiction, including A New Kind of Country, Voyage to Greenland, Fishing with John, and The Curve of Time. These works represent a form of storytelling I truly enjoy, and I am beginning to think this might be the right format for my story.

I adored The Curve of Time when I first read it in my twenties. The author’s adventures with her children on a boat seemed thrilling and free. Re-reading it now, I was startled by how differently it landed. The introduction, written by her grandchildren, praises her unconventional spirit, but I could not help noticing that no one described her as particularly kind or loving. Her fearlessness now strikes me as recklessness. Age, it seems, has changed my sense of what counts as admirable. I still respect the feats and adventures the family undertook, but not always how their mother treated her children.

Right now, my creative process is mostly a duet between me and ChatGPT, who is checking spelling and consistency while I ramble freely with a disregard for any structure. My wise friend Charlotte calls this writing a “vomit version.” Purge all of the ideas onto paper and see where they lead.

Even though I have not yet let anyone else in with the book, I know that collaboration has always been how I produce my best work. Soon, I will start sharing pieces with trusted friends to see if there is something worth shaping further.

For now, I am trying to take Amie McNee’s advice and create messy art. To make room for uncertainty, to trust that the shape will emerge in its own time. It is a little like standing on a deck in fog, not yet seeing the shore but knowing it is out there somewhere. I suspect the shore will appear just as I stop looking for it, as these things tend to do.