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“I’m really messed up, aren’t I?”

As my friend said these words to me, her big blue eyes looked at me searchingly. It felt as though half of her needed me to confirm this terrible thing she knew, but the other half needed me to tell her she was really OK.

Laura had just spent the last half hour confessing her sins and trying to understand why she was doing things she didn’t consciously want to do. She was confused. She was angry with herself. And she was hurting.

She has a boyfriend who she assures me is wonderful. (I haven’t met him, so I can’t say.) He’s perfect in every way, she says, both as a man and as someone who she would hope to marry. She admits that he doesn’t understand her (and never will) and that he makes her uncomfortable at times, but he still checks all the “husband material” check boxes in her mind.

What she doesn’t understand is why she’s pushing him away — and she doesn’t understand why she cheated on him.

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As the red Honda pulled up behind my car, I was afraid I was blocking the road. Lucy and I were at my favorite sunset spot Tuesday evening and I had been taking pictures, so I decided I’d leave rather than be in someone’s way.

But as I opened the door to get back into my car, a heavily accented voice called out, “You don’t have to leave. It’s OK.”

I wasn’t sure at first what he meant or what he wanted, but he pointed to the sunset. And I understood he had come there for the amazing natural beauty being painted in the sky toward the horizon.

I find few people who make an effort to come watch sunsets, so we struck up a conversation about the beauty and about other spots nearby where there was a good view. He was clearly just as passionate about beauty as I am.

Gerardo Alvarez-Chavez is originally from Mexico City. He said he hadn’t had many opportunities for his future back in Mexico, so he had come here seeking a better like. He owns his own painting service, according to his business card.

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Motivation should come from within. That’s what everybody says. You can read it in self-help books and on motivational posters. It’s what every well-meaning friend tells you.

Needing motivation from someone else is a crutch.

Ideas have always been easy for me, but being able to execute on those ideas has been trickier. I start projects and I can even know that a piece of work would be good if I finished it, but I lack the motivation to finish.

I end up staring at a blank page that never turns into a script. I look over old notes from a book project that never made it. I look at ideas I love — projects stillborn yet still full of possible life — and I feel powerless to breathe life into them. I crave a flesh-and-blood motivation — admiration, love, approval, passion — to inspire me to make my art.

I long for a crutch to help me walk.

For many years, I had wanted to make a film. I had ideas and I talked about making a first short film for a long time. But for years it was only talk — until something changed.

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