That Desire to Take Up Space With Our Art
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“You are all so humble,” he said, looking a bit confused. Just then, the Zoom breakout room ended, and I had to swallow what I had been about to blurt out, which was, “No, we’re all women.”
In our conversation, where he had shared the pleasure of trying new online projects and seeing which ones found an audience, we had described our fears about charging too much for our writing or taking up too much of our readers’ time.
I keep talking to women in different spheres who are creating beautiful things and who feel so scared. We have been told not to take up too much space, not to take our work too seriously, not to ask for too much compensation.
It’s exhausting. In that writers’ Zoom call yesterday, I wanted to take those women by the virtual shoulders and say, “You are allowed to write about whatever you want! You are allowed to charge money for your work!” I want to take my own shoulders and say the same thing.
Because under the fear, there is so much beauty and truth and light that wants to come out through us. And I think that’s why we keep showing up to the work even when it terrifies us. Deep in our bones, we believe in the power of our art — and we desire to take up
s o
m u c h
s p a c e.
Photos by the author of reliquaries from the Museo del Tesoro di San Lorenzo in Florence.
