A "Making Things" Manifesto

I posted a little while ago about a “Spoon Manifesto” that I ran across on the internet.  In it, a carver explained why he makes spoons.  While a don’t share all of that carver’s sentiments, it made me think about why I make things.  It is something that I have thought about before, and I have talked about it with my wife and with Laughter. 

Why do I make things?  What is that desire that keeps me searching for new things to make or new ways to make familiar things? 

These answers spring to mind first:

1) it is fun to make things. 

2) I feel a sense of accomplishment when I make things.

3) I like the attention that I get when I make something cool.

4) I am easily bored by inaction, so making things is just something I have to do to stay mentally healthy.

But, as I started to make my list of reasons for making things, like the Spoon Manifesto that I posted earlier, I found all the reasons lacking.  Then I remembered this talk by President Dieter F. Uchtorf, from October of 2008, entitled “Happiness, Your Heritage.”  In it, he talked about this very thing.  He says it very well, so I quote it and say Amen:

The desire to create is one of the deepest yearnings of the human soul. No matter our talents, education, backgrounds, or abilities, we each have an inherent wish to create something that did not exist before.

Everyone can create. You don’t need money, position, or influence in order to create something of substance or beauty.

Creation brings deep satisfaction and fulfillment. We develop ourselves and others when we take unorganized matter into our hands and mold it into something of beauty. . .

You might say, “I’m not the creative type. . . .”

If that is how you feel, think again, and remember that you are spirit daughters of the most creative Being in the universe. Isn’t it remarkable to think that your very spirits are fashioned by an endlessly creative and eternally compassionate God? Think about it—your spirit body is a masterpiece, created with a beauty, function, and capacity beyond imagination.

But to what end were we created? We were created with the express purpose and potential of experiencing a fulness of joy. Our birthright—and the purpose of our great voyage on this earth—is to seek and experience eternal happiness. One of the ways we find this is by creating things.

. . . .

You may think you don’t have talents, but that is a false assumption, for we all have talents and gifts, every one of us. The bounds of creativity extend far beyond the limits of a canvas or a sheet of paper and do not require a brush, a pen, or the keys of a piano. Creation means bringing into existence something that did not exist before—colorful gardens, harmonious homes, family memories, flowing laughter.

What you create doesn’t have to be perfect. So what if the eggs are greasy or the toast is burned? Don’t let fear of failure discourage you. Don’t let the voice of critics paralyze you—whether that voice comes from the outside or the inside.

If you still feel incapable of creating, start small. Try to see how many smiles you can create, write a letter of appreciation, learn a new skill, identify a space and beautify it.

. . . .

The more you trust and rely upon the Spirit, the greater your capacity to create. That is your opportunity in this life and your destiny in the life to come. Sisters, trust and rely on the Spirit. As you take the normal opportunities of your daily life and create something of beauty and helpfulness, you improve not only the world around you but also the world within you.

Why make spoons?

I just found this very interesting "Spoon Manifesto" on  http://www.wholecommunities.org/alumni/spoons.shtml.  These are not the reasons that I make spoons and other things, but I really enjoy his thinking.  In fact, I am going to write my own spoon manifesto and share it with you within the next few days or so.  In the meantime, enjoy what Peter Forbes has to say about it:

The Spoon Manifesto
(Peter Forbes, July, 1999)

Many years ago, in downeast Maine, I met a man who quickly became a friend and teacher. I began regularly visiting Bill at his homestead at Dickinson’s Reach, a place that united my life as conservationist and photographer. Bill’s homestead and miles of coastline are almost the perfect blend of the wild and the civilized, the forest and the home. His life work of learning from this land changed forever my perception of what it means to live well, and for whom and what purpose we conserve land. Bill put a crooked knife into my hand and taught me how to carve a spoon, and I’ve never stopped. This gift of a spoon, along with an explanation for why I carve them, is my act of continuing to plant that seed.

• Renewal . I can create something useful and beautiful from nature. It is a dance we do together. Making a spoon harms nothing and may actually add to the beauty in the world.
• Joy. Carving is a joyful pleasure. It allows me to focus, frees my mind from abstraction, and strengthens my hands. The only person I can save is myself, and carving this spoon saves me.
• Reality. When I cut my finger, the blood is real.
• Equality. Anyone can carve spoons. A nine-year-old friend carved the best first-spoon I ever saw.
• Symbolism . This small wooden spoon and how it came from my hands is gentle encouragement to me of larger things I might be able to do.
• Completeness. In carving a spoon I saw the limb, split the wood, cut the block, watch the spoon emerge, mail it to you. The entire process is from within me and a tree.
• Friendship. I honor my friend Bill each time I make a spoon. I only need a few spoons, so I can also honor other people by giving them away.
• Democracy. There’s orneriness in carving a spoon. It’s my way of quietly but emphatically expressing my beliefs. A wooden spoon and plastic spoon say very different things.
• Human expression. Each spoon I carve ends up unique. I hope the same for my life and yours.
• Usefulness. Carving a spoon makes me be fully present. I listen better. I find that I need to say fewer things because my hands and mind are fruitfully at work. I can wait until my heart is pounding before I need to utter a word.
• Sabbath . I work and think much too much. Carving slows me down. Eating with a wooden spoon is a form of daily Sabbath, a gentle reminder for me to slow down.
• Humility. Yes, it does all these things for me but, in the end, it’s just a wooden spoon.

A cottage industry for families

Those who read this blog (all five of you) know that I like to make things.  You should also know that nothing is more important than living the Gospel of Jesus Christ and raising our children to believe and live it.  So I loved these words that I heard today.  This is from a talk that Boyd K. Packer, an apostle, gave in April 1995:

The ministry of the prophets and apostles leads them ever and always to the home and the family. That shield of faith is not produced in a factory but at home in a cottage industry.

The ultimate purpose of all we teach is to unite parents and children in faith in the Lord Jesus Christ, that they are happy at home, sealed in an eternal marriage, linked to their generations, and assured of exaltation in the presence of our Heavenly Father.

Lest parents and children be “tossed to and fro,” and misled by “cunning craftiness” of men who “lie in wait to deceive” (Eph. 4:14), our Father’s plan requires that, like the generation of life itself, the shield of faith is to be made and fitted in the family. No two can be exactly alike. Each must be handcrafted to individual specifications.

The plan designed by the Father contemplates that man and woman, husband and wife, working together, fit each child individually with a shield of faith made to buckle on so firmly that it can neither be pulled off nor penetrated by those fiery darts.

It takes the steady strength of a father to hammer out the metal of it and the tender hands of a mother to polish and fit it on. Sometimes one parent is left to do it alone. It is difficult, but it can be done.

In the Church we can teach about the materials from which a shield of faith is made: reverence, courage, chastity, repentance, forgiveness, compassion. In church we can learn how to assemble and fit them together. But the actual making of and fitting on of the shield of faith belongs in the family circle. Otherwise it may loosen and come off in a crisis.

The prophets and Apostles know full well that the perilous times Paul prophesied for the last days are now upon us: “Men [are] lovers of their own selves, covetous, boasters, proud, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, unthankful, unholy, without natural affection” (see 2 Tim. 3:1–7).

Knowing it would be so, the Lord warned that “inasmuch as parents have children in Zion, or in any of her stakes, … that teach them not to understand the doctrine of repentance, faith in Christ the Son of the living God, and of baptism and the gift of the Holy Ghost, … the sin be upon the heads of the parents.

“For this shall be a law unto the inhabitants of Zion. …

“And they shall also teach their children to pray, and to walk uprightly before the Lord” (D&C 68:25–28).

This shield of faith is not manufactured on an assembly line, only handmade in a cottage industry. Therefore our leaders press members to understand that what is most worth doing must be done at home. Some still do not see that too many out-of-home activities, however well intended, leave too little time to make and fit on the shield of faith at home.

Now it's time to stop reading and continue hammering and shaping some shields.

Why don't more judges write like this?

The Ninth Circuit just issued an opinion discussing whether a jail was a detention facility within the meaning of a certain federal statute. The majority took about 7 pages to say that it was not. Chief Judge Kozinski disagreed in about 8 pages. But the first paragraph of his dissent is just wonderful writing:

Freud is reported to have said that sometimes a cigar is just a cigar. And a facility used for holding prisoners prior to trial is a pretrial detention facility. The Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act (RLUIPA) covers prisoners held in certain kinds of institutions—defined to include both correctional facilities (such as prisons and jails) and pretrial detention facilities. Souhair Khatib was held in a facility where prisoners are routinely detained awaiting trial and other court appearances. She was therefore held in a facility covered by RLUIPA and is entitled to its protections. This pretty much sums up the case for me. Everything below is unnecessary and you could easily skip it.

I wish more judges wrote like that.