The Friction of Nothing Being Wrong
A Letter from the Attic Living Room Sofa?
Tonight, I wanted to write. The time was open. My favorite time to write upstairs in the attic (there is something peaceful about writing at 2:30am). The idea was starting to brew. I could feel a blog post trying to take shape. There was no crisis. No broken gear. No distraction strong enough to blame. And yet, when I got home—I couldn’t begin.
Everything around me functioned just fine. And that was the problem. It wasn’t the machines. It wasn’t the chair. It wasn’t the light. It was the stillness of something misaligned—something internal. The creative current just... didn’t arrive.
I paced a little. I even felt lost, if I can use that word for my anxious, almost nervous response to standing there, contemplating the weight of doing absolutely nothing.
I often light a cigar and walk up to the attic late at night when I write. Not out of indulgence, but tradition. It’s a kind of key. A ritual doorway. Maybe it's a bad habit, but something about it just feels right.
The moment I step through the attic threshold, I become something else:
The artist
The philosopher (this one feels weird to say, but I try)
The witness
Basically, I become the version of me I love the most.
Lately, I've cut back—not out of guilt, just practicality. Cigars can be expensive, and I enjoy a tasty Rusty Nail with them. That combination—Scotch whisky with a bit of Drambuie and smoke—can become a costly creative crutch, if you know what I mean.
“The beer wasn’t great. The moment was.”
July 2025 – Main studio, late night. The Sony Alpha 7siii was rigged and ready to capture the quiet ritual of making art after hours. A warm beer sat nearby, doing its part—not in flavor, but in presence. — © Michael Warth
So tonight, I stayed downstairs in the living room, waiting for the mood to strike from a less sacred seat—a place that should feel cozy and comfortable. I eventually moved to the main studio—nothing more than a spare bedroom in the house but still mine. (If you want to learn more about my mindset on creative space, check this post out)
It turns out, the muse doesn’t always arrive where the signal is strongest. The living room wasn’t perfect at first but it ended up being the the launchpad for a creative night.
The muse shows up where the air is different. Where intention was lit like a flame—through habit, through history, through the smallest acts that told the mind: now, we begin.
It isn’t about everything being perfect.
Making art is about being perfectly you
We will always encounter some kind of friction when it comes to making art—or doing the things that inspire us to live the life we love.
Never forget this: pushing through the friction, the imperfect situation, the imperfect gear, the imperfect whatever—is what really matters.
The muse is waiting.
Your art will wake up if you just push through.
I almost allowed the imperfections and friction feed the procrastination. And that’s the point of this post. We all do it. I’m not special either—I often don’t push through it. But today I did. My favorite night of the week to reflect and write almost became a wasted moment on the sofa watching something on the television.
I’m happy I pushed through. This post is more for me than I care to admit. One could call it a case study in why we need to just keep going and allow our creative spark to show up while we are working. One of those do as I say not as I do moments because I fail more at this than I like to admit.
It’s late now. The beer’s warm and to be honest it is not a good beer anyway. The muse has finally shown up—but only after I let the story be what it was:
a night not in the attic…but a letter from it, all the same.
