Dear Sunday: labor
on making, contentment, & inspiration's doorway
In a world influenced by automation and digital immediacy, making something by hand is simultaneously ancient and urgent. I find this urgency is not fast, though. It’s more like when a piece of fruit is perfectly ripe. Making something by hand is slow, with an inescapable intimacy between maker and object, whether a poem, a letter, a bowl, a loaf of bread, a home, or a road. The deliberate hand movements embed time and attention into the work. This quiet devotion feels distant from our efficiency-driven world, where speed and quantity often precede depth and care.
But lately, I’ve been thinking about what it means to create something by hand, to work in a way that leaves the maker's imprint on the object. How does this tactile labor connect us to ourselves and the world?
The word labor comes from the Latin laborare, meaning “to toil” or “to strive.” It conjures images of effort and exertion, hands in the soil or tools carving wood. Its evolution has expanded to include physical work and the intellectual and emotional striving embedded in creative acts. Craft, from Old English cræft, originally meant “power” or “skill.” In its earliest sense, crafting was both an act of creation and an assertion of the maker’s abilities, an inseparable link between doing and being.
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Throughout history, labor and craft have been revered as acts of devotion. Medieval guilds elevated the work of artisans, embedding craftsmanship with meaning and purpose. In ancient Japan, a calligrapher or poet could trade their art for gold and silk in the market. Later, the Arts and Crafts movement of the 19th century responded to the dehumanizing effects of industrialization by championing the beauty and humanity of handmade work. At its core, making reconnects us to something essential—the soul as a creator. Everyone is creative in one way or another, whether through art, words, or small acts that shape our daily lives.
Yet, today, labor has often been reduced to its economic value. The hands are rarely seen, their efforts hidden behind sleek, manufactured surfaces. This cultural shift has left many longing for tangible, personal, and meaningful work.
As a poet and calligrapher, I often reflect on the relationship between the physicality of my work and its creative and emotional weight. When I dip a pen into ink or shape a poem on paper, there’s a dialogue between my hands and my thoughts, a rhythm that allows ideas to unfold. The labor of creation slows my mind, rooting me in the present moment. I told a friend the other day that when writing a poem, I often hear a voice and widen myself to be a conduit. I move intuitively, letting the intuition through. It reminds me of Pablo Picasso's statement: “Inspiration exists, but it has to find you working.”
Labor is the doorway through which inspiration walks.
Countless creatives have explored this connection between hand and mind. In his essays and poetry, Gary Snyder writes of labor as a spiritual practice, aligning oneself with the natural world's rhythms. For Snyder, chopping wood or writing poems are not separate acts but different expressions of the same devotion.
Meaning is found in this devotion to the process rather than the product. Laboring with hands reminds us that creativity is not about perfection or speed but presence.
Prompts for Reflection
To explore the texture of work in your own life, here are a few prompts:
1. The Sensation of Making: Choose a creative act—writing, drawing, kneading dough, knitting, cooking, or anything else that requires your hands. Pay attention to the physical sensations of the process. Write about what you notice and how it shapes your experience of the work.
2. The Story of an Object: Select a handmade object in your home—a quilt, a ceramic mug, or a wooden bowl. Reflect on its story: Who made it? What tools shaped it? How does it feel to hold or use it?
3. Labor as Devotion: Think of a task that requires your hands but might not traditionally be seen as creative—washing dishes, weeding a garden, folding laundry. How can you approach it with the same intention and care as making art?
To labor with your hands is to engage in a conversation—with the materials, your thoughts, the world. It is an act of attention and care, embedding meaning into the mundane. This leads to ordinary contentment. And contentment is the birth of peace.
“Contentment has learned how to find out what she needs to know. Last year she went on a major housecleaning spree. First she stood on her head until all the extra facts fell out. Then she discarded about half her house. Now she knows where every thing comes from—who dyed the yarn dark green and who wove the rug and who built the loom, who made the willow chair, who planted the apricot trees. She made the turquoise mugs herself with clay she found in the hills beyond her house.
When Contentment is sad, she takes a mud bath or goes to the mountains until her lungs are clear. When she walks through an unfamiliar neighborhood, she always makes friends with the local cats.”—J. Ruth Gendler
The texture of work, when approached with devotion, reminds us that fulfillment isn’t found in the finished product but in the act of making itself. Happiness lies in the quiet details of creation—the rhythm, the care, the presence it requires.
So, what will you make today—not for the sake of efficiency, but for the sake of connection?
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As usual, please tell me everything. I’m on the other side of a letter.
Love,
Lindsey
PS,
Of note this week:
Red attractor, Ways of Seeing, and this menu from 1920:
