Lessons from a Daybed

Lovelies,

This month I took my songwriting to Jamaica.

I was thrilled to reconnect with a wonderful Jamaican artist I've collaborated with for years. I could only imagine what a few more days together would reveal. 

But I also boarded the plane with desperation. From minute one, 2025 has been a stress barrage. I was not sustaining it. At least, I was not interested in the version of me that was sustaining it. 

My week called for more than surrendering to the sensual peace of Jamaica. My week called for recalibration. 

What's so neat is that I did it. I took steps back to myself. By the end of the week I felt deeply well.

My next mission would be to stay well. I would once-and-for-all learn to intersperse all my effort with periods of rest. 

Then this:

My last evening with Jodi we lay on daybeds while the sun set over the water. We'd attempted songwriting a few times, to varying degrees of not-success, and now we succumbed to straight lounging. But laughing, stretching, we distractedly, accidentally, started working. Throwing around lyrics, rhymes. I suggested a song form. She sang, I picked out chords on her keyboard.

For the first time in my life I wrote a song start-to-finish lying down.

And after, walking to my room, I felt so deeply restored.

In my creativity coaching I preach this: Creativity requires our energy on every level. Physical, mental, emotional, social, spiritual. Anyone interested in creating must become great at rest.

But now I wonder. Is creativity inherently depleting? Or do I just think it is because of how I do it?

I think it might be a bit of both. I think creativity is heightened and I don't want it to be otherwise. But I realize now, more often than not I create, as with many things I do, in fight-or-flight.

I think my creativity is not as exempt from my psychology as I thought. 

So returning to California, my mission changed. I'm less interested in interspersing effort with rest. I'm more interested in this question: How can I create as a form of rest?

With love,

Rachel

I told you about my wonderful feature in the San Francisco Chronicle before I knew the most remarkable part: I was on the cover of the Datebook! I promise you I didn't manifest this, because never in a million years did I imagine my work highlighted in such a way!

It really means so much to be championed by my beloved Bay Area.

In other news, I am deep in vocal production. My days are an exquisite mix of vocal editing, vocal arranging, and vocal... singing! What this means for you is that my three productions currently in the works — David Hobbes, Frankie Bengtson, and Mira Multari — inch closer to you hearing them.