I’ve loved Sr. Corita Kent’s “Rules” for Immaculate Heart College’s art department since seeing them on Austin Kleon’s blog, but of all the rules, Rule 8 wasn’t one that stuck with me. I am much more a Rule 9 and Helpful Hints kinda gal, but the other day I was thinking about the difference between reading a book and writing a book, and I thought of Rule 8: “Don’t try to create and analyze at the same time. They’re different processes.” First, I’m not saying that reading a book is the same thing as analyzing it… but maybe I am? We tend to define analysis as this super-serious and intellectual thing, but at its heart, analysis is to study something with care, to look closely, to learn the nature of something. When we read deeply, are we not doing this? When we delve into a book (not just skim it or run across it like basilisk lizards), aren’t we looking closely? Aren’t we trying to learn the nature of the story, of the ideas, of the author who gave voice to its words?
Rule 8 feels like another way of saying that when we take something in, it’s a different process than putting something out into the world. When I read, I’m looking closely at something that is outside myself: I’m taking it in.
When I write, I’m releasing something from within: I’m letting it out.
And these two processes must be different, though related. I can’t be looking closely at something and studying it with care if I’m in the midst of releasing it. My eye is directed inward when I am creating. It’s only once the thing has been released that my mind’s eye can be directed outward. But it’s the cycle between these two visions that Rule 8 is hinting at. It’s not one or the other: it’s not all creating or all analyzing all the time. It’s creating: putting things out into the world. And then it is analyzing: taking things in from the world. Or vice versa. Not sure it matters which comes first, the creating or analyzing. But it’s the interplay between the two, the cycle. That is what matters. We just have to remember to not try to do both at the same time. We can’t steep the tea and drink it at the same time.
