I am not a trained artist. My figures are wobbly. My perspective is approximate. My proportions are charitably described as "expressive."
I have kept a sketchbook for three years, and it has changed how I see.
What a Sketchbook Is For
Most people think a sketchbook is for producing drawings. It isn't — or at least, it doesn't have to be.
A sketchbook is for looking. It is a tool for paying attention.
When you draw something — even badly — you have to look at it longer than you would otherwise. You notice the way light falls on a coffee cup. You observe that a leaf is not just green but forty shades of green.
This kind of attention is, I believe, a form of prayer.
Getting Started
Buy the cheapest sketchbook you can find. Use whatever pen is in your bag. Spend five minutes drawing something in front of you — your keys, your hand, the view from your window.
Don't show anyone. This is not for an audience.
Do it again tomorrow.
The Accumulation
After six months, you'll have a record of your days unlike any photograph can offer — slower, more particular, traced with your own attention.
That record, those small accumulated acts of looking, will have taught you something that is very hard to teach any other way: how to be present.
