Of Mess and Moxie: Wrangling Delight Out of This Wild and Glorious Life

by Jen Hatmaker

Your mess is normal, and it is okay to admit it. Pain is not exceptional or rare. If you’ve lived longer than five minutes, you already know this. Not because your particular brand of life is exceptionally punishing or you are doing everything exceptionally wrong, but because, as it turns out, this is how it is for everyone. This is the price of being a human on this planet; we get the glorious and the grueling, and surprisingly, the second often leads to the first. Trust this messy transparent who loves you. We are in the same boat.

We will endure discouragement, heartbreak, failure, and suffering. All of us. And more than once. And in more than one category. And in more than one season. But we are the very same folks who can experience triumph, perseverance, joy, and rebirth. More than once. And in more than one category. And in more than one season.

You don’t have to be who you first were. That early version of yourself, that season you were in, even the phase you are currently experiencing—it is all good or purposeful or at least useful and created a fuller, nuanced you and contributed to your life’s meaning, but you are not stuck in a category just because you were once branded that way. Just because something was does not mean it will always be.

We have these magnificent minds and hands and ideas and visions, and they beg us to pay attention, give them permission, give them life.

This bears out in one thousand different ways: we write, sculpt, paint, speak, dance, craft, film, design, photograph, draw, bring order, beautify, garden, innovate, produce, cook, invent, fashion, sing, compose, imagine. It looks like art, it looks like music, it looks like community, it looks like splendor.

The expanding balloon in your chest requires a few things. Time, for instance. Creating takes minutes and hours. Living a creative life means making room to dream, craft, compose, produce. It often requires a firm rejection of martyrdom, and I mean that sincerely. The narrative we accept sometimes includes prioritizing all other humans, tasks, and line items to the exclusion of creativity. How dare I? we ask. There are more pressing needs in my life than this artistic expression.

creators create and creating is work and work takes time.

pay attention to what good art does: How does it use language? How does it convey emotions? What are the obvious elements? What are the intangibles? How does it move the story along? How does it develop? How does it sound? How does it look? How does it feel? Notice what inspires you and moves you and speaks to you

There is no scarcity in creativity. The world always needs good offerings. We cannot have too much beauty. There is no such thing as too much wisdom and literature and story and craftsmanship. There is room for you. Don’t be intimidated by successful makers; be inspired by them. Creativity doesn’t divide but multiply, finding new expressions in everyone inspired by someone else’s gift.

It is a lovely illusion that looks beautiful from afar but becomes sharp and artificial to the touch, if not initially, eventually. The ensuing wreckage will outpace the fantasy.

When our spiritual spaces are homogenous, it silences the hundreds of alternative stories that experience vibrancy or suffering outside the “

If it is possible to feel both judgmental about something ridiculous while at the same time fully participating in its jackassery, that is my complicity in Southern Football.