“WOULD BE CARVERS WOULD BE CARVERS IF THEY WOULD CARVE WOOD.”

The WOOD BEE CARVER, Donald K. Mertz has used the statement above as his philosophy for the experience of carving wood.  A part of this philosophy’s meaning is that one is always learning, always a “would be” in the process of growing and becoming.

The experience of wood carving, like so many other activities is learned primarily in the doing and the more one does the more one learns.  It is like the old saying, “Turning the soil over in your mind will not plow the field.” Good intentions do not become good until the intention is acted upon.  So it is with wood carving, or anything else one does and for that matter, living life to its fullest each day, it is in the living and the doing that we become.

Also a part of this philosopnhy implies that one never arrives at being fully accomplished, or that one knows all that needs to be known for we are always learning, becoming and reaching new levels of being.  As the old adage states, ” It is not what you know that counts, it is what you learn after you know it all that really counts.” So, “would be carvers” or any other “would be’s” are still in the process of becoming all they can be by continuing to do.