THE WELL WITHIN WORKSHOP

Overheard on a flight from L.A. to Chicago, an exchange between a young mom and dad and their very young son who sat between them:

Mom (to dad): It’s late. I’m going to get him into his pajamas.
Dad: He can put on his own pajamas. He’s a big boy.
Son: I can put on my own pajamas. I’m a big boy.

(Pause)

Son: I can put on my own pajamas. I’m a Jedi.

It was mid-August when John came home and announced that he’d found the perfect spot for The Well Within Workshop, a storefront in an old building in downtown Batavia, a city 6 miles west of our home. Though the structure “needed a little work,” he proposed that we buy the building.

But we’re not “buy-the-building” type of people was my first thought, and a curious one at that. After all, what constitutes a “buy-the-building” type of person?

I’m not sure The Well Within Workshop needs 1500-square-feet came soon thereafter. What was I thinking? If I was to allow my vision for the workshop to be as big as it needed to be, with working studio space and a reading library and utility sinks and a lounge area, wouldn’t it need every inch of 1500-square-feet?

The trifecta of no came during our walk through the building. Despite its beautiful bones and 116-year-long history, it became undeniably clear that nothing short of a complete top-to-basement overhaul would save this place.

As I turn to my husband to ask him whether he’d gone out of his mind, he turns to me and he’s radiant. Beaming from ear-to-ear, he declares, “Isn’t it great?!!”

.     .     .

Creativity is great. Whether it’s a renovation project, a painting, a sculpture or a workshop, you dive headlong into the deep unknown, having no idea what you’re getting into or how it’s all going to unfold. You come up against your edges and your limits again and again. Yet in spite of the cacophony of resistance that’s urging you to stop, you don’t.

My own next edge comes on August 28 when I present to the Batavia City Council The Well Within Workshop as a creative space where, using simple materials and simple strategies, folks can come home to themselves by learning to tap their own well within. I’ll underscore the proven health and well-being benefits available to anyone who learns how to invoke that force built into all of us through millions of years of evolution, a force that allows us to discover our most essential selves, to be healthier, whole human beings in mind, body, and spirit.

May the force be with you.