There is something profound about setting out on a path laid out before you of a project. It does not matter what it is, what it involves or how big or small it isn't that important. You are going to start something and you are going to create where previously there was nought. From a negation you are reordering the physical or metaphysical to create something and that is profoundly human. How many Magpies do you witness building a wall or how many whales set up a media server to stream Trailer Park Boys so they can sack off their Nutfucks subscriptions? We alone have the critical eye to have a go at bodging a DIY fix on a plasterboard or embark on trying to make their own kitchen.
I for a long time had millions of projects on the go at all times and was across a lot of new things and ideas (to me at least). Then I became a parent and it all changed. Gone were the peerless afternoons of leisure, when the labour movement demanded 8 hours for work, 8 hours for leisure and 8 hours for rest they didn't have ridiculously easy admin jobs and work from home potential to piss it off work and spend 6 hours of your work day making a scale model. My stimulation and exploration was encouraged and enabled by the bullshit model of modern work as the truth is that actually with a little management which I routinely get wrong and drop myself into a pickle it is incredibly easy to sack work off and do what you want. As I said when I became a parent my situation changed however, now I have more days dedicated to work and no small child running around I am getting back to what I want. A project and some aim or accomplishment in a future that is not there yet.
Yesterday for example I baked a Focaccia because I thought it would be nice for tea and cased some tobacco for a blend I am creating. The Focaccia was banging, the tobacco smelled divine and the working title of the blend is 'Zizeks' Tick'. Or maybe 'Back-garden-Gammon' I haven't decided. It's important to sit on these things and let them ruminate around and the older I get the more I need or want to reflect on something. Projects give you the perfect environment to let that happen, you have a task and ahead of you lie all the paths to take. Some of them wrong and some of them right and the beauty is you get to go down all of them if you want and see what is down there. If you don't like it you can always turn tail and go somewhere else and see what it has in store for you. It's your choice.
It does not just have to be exclusively for things that create or do, it could be as simple as deciding to reading a book or cooking a recipe you want to taste. You have the option and the means to do something, in fact in general I think it is time that I start by living by this a little bit more. Always be on a project, always be creating. Yes there is life that gets in the way, its messy or your tired and sometimes it is raining. Who cares? Always be creating and always be investigating this world and exploring wherever your ideas take you. What is the downside to it? I think it is too easy to sit back and take the passive approach. It is easy to not be present and to not apply a critical thought but the opposite of this is also true. It is easy to apply a critical thought, it is easy to wonder or to investigate. Curiosity is a cat that needs fed.