Nick Cave’s Practice
Designed by Bearmore
Inspired by Nick CaveThe most meaningful work might be the work that you postpone.
End your day better than you started, with time spent meaningfully. Inspired by Nick Cave's Brighton writing life: a few minutes of prayer, a poem, writing on one meaningful question, then time to play the piano.
The runsheet
A few minutes of quietness
MantraNick writes about church as a kind of liberation and treats prayer as a serious practice. Take a few quiet minutes sitting with a single phrase or intention. If prayer isn't for you, repeat one word instead.
10 min activityBearmore’s thoughts on doing mantra before reading (mindful)
This works well because any focused calm from mantra can carry into mindful reading and sustained attention.
Read some poems
Reading (mindful)Nick reads widely and seriously, from Trakl's poems to Pinocchio to scripture. Choose one short passage you can really sit with and get something from it. A poem, a psalm, or a few pages of a novel all do the job.
15 min activityBearmore’s thoughts on doing reading (mindful) before creative writing
This is an excellent pairing because reading primes the rhythms and patterns of language, which writing then draws on without needing much warming up.
Write with the freedom to be yourself
Creative writingThis is the engine of The Red Hand Files: Nick sits at the desk in office hours and answers one question from someone who writes into the Red Hand Files. Pick a question that matters to you and write until it feels answered.
35 min activityBearmore’s thoughts on doing creative writing before creating music
This can help because music-making can express any insights and emotions from writing in a different way.
Piano
Creating musicIn his 'Describe your day' file Nick often ends up at the piano singing old religious songs with his son Earl and an Omnichord. Close with music rather than words, playing or humming a few chords with no audience required.
20 min activityTime well spent.
1h 40m spent doing something good for yourself.
The breakdown
Burst evaluation
Wellbeing focus
About this Burst
Nick Cave is an Australian musician, writer and frontman of Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds, based in Brighton, England. Across four decades he has made albums from Murder Ballads to Wild God, written the novels And the Ass Saw the Angel and The Death of Bunny Munro, and the grief memoir Faith, Hope and Carnage with Sean O'Hagan. Since 2018 he has run The Red Hand Files, an unmoderated newsletter where he answers readers' questions one at a time.