to be creative or not
by haywardhelen
I think about playing the piano a lot. I imagine drawing after dinner. I fantasise about how my garden might look. But then I let myself be put off. I move the plants I want to plant near the back door. I even water them. But I don’t get around to planting them. I listen to my daughter pound the piano keys as I busy myself in the kitchen. At night, instead of getting out my drawing things and putting on some music, I pull out The Guardian Weekly and immerse myself in important world events.
I have good excuses for not being creative. I am busy. I have writing deadlines, yoga classes to teach, washing to hang up, a dog to walk, a family to cook for. I don’t twiddle my thumbs. Yet I seem incapable of prioritising my time to make room for my own desires. Am I so timid? Am I really so afraid of failing? Have I internalised such high expectations that my creative efforts are more of a struggle than they need to be? Does my inner critic even care if I fumble to read the notes on piano pieces? Does it matter if my drawings are not wildly good? Will anyone notice if I plant things in the wrong place or a few don’t thrive?
What stops me investing in those things that I want to do, over and above necessity? Am I lazy? Or is it that I exhaust all my energy doing things I feel I have to do, leaving precious little for the things I care about more? Am I waiting for my kids to leave home? For retirement? Or am I just bad at organising my time, letting the demands of housework lord it over my creativity?
I am not lazy. I am capable of organising my time. But I do struggle with loose time, always have – even before technology came along and gobbled up so much of it. Thinking about it, if drawing and gardening and playing the piano were my job, they’d be easier to prioritise. Even yoga, now that I’m teaching it, is easier because it’s not optional. I need to do yoga regularly in order to teach it, and so I do. But the rest, well it’s just harder. Accountable only to myself, I defer and put off.
Now I have admitted my problem, what now? Do I cajole, harass or bully myself? Or just sit with it, play with it and see what follows? Any tips gratefully received. Otherwise, I’ll keep you posted.
I sympathise however I seem to be at the opposite end. I’m still finding it difficult to motivate myself. I’ve never been very organised but this year any focus/motivation I may have had has disappeared! No children at home, retired, normally read lots,
Continued ….
but reading takes longer, writing a book review takes longer still. The words just don’t come.
What I have enjoyed is drawing. Getting paints out became an effort for some reason but at the end of March I joined some portrait and life drawing sessions via zoom. I wasn’t a fan of pencil drawing but now I keep small sketchpad, pencil and putty rubber beside me. I sketch random faces from photos, TV (pause it). It’s a great way to relax and yet focus on something other than wall to wall covid news. And since March there has been a bit of an improvement in my drawing. Best wishes.
I reckon I might challenge you to doing one small thing from your un-acted-on creative list each day. If you start small you won’t frighten your unconscious into a fierce resistance. Just do it, don’t try to enjoy it (which you might experience as a demand) or to achieve anything from it – and get back to me in 3 weeks’ time!
Sorry no tips from me, but you aren’t alone. I am the same, I know my 2 main reasons for this behaviour, fear of not getting it right/failure/not be good enough and guilt, guilt that these things aren’t for the benefit of others or that I’m spending money on myself. Yes I know that if I take care of myself and fill my cup etc etc then I’m better able to show up for others and so they do benefit from me doing these things. Knowing something intellectually and believing it at a cellular, heart space level are two entirely different things. Even when I question, Well do I really want to do …? If I truely wanted to do it wouldn’t I make it happen? doesn’t help because sometimes yes I do truely want to do it. I still can’t get past all the fears.
Sorry no help, I do hope you get some tips because I’m interested too.
Cheers Kate
So I am not alone, thank you.
I think your point about knowing something intellectually, yet not absorbing it as lived understanding is a good one.
Perhaps creativity, like sexuality, is something that we do first and articulate second. Perhaps all our talk about creativity is a cover for not doing it. A weird form of anhedonia (not seeking pleasure).
I think the answer might be to be creative without naming it, normalising it, making it into something that we do even when we don’t feel like it, because it’s Sunday afternoon, or whatever.
Thanks Kate, and let me know if anything shifts –
I could have written this – verbatim. And it hasn’t made any difference with retirement. I do write – but need an external deadline; I garden as a task not for personal enjoyment, but I do love the results; I do yoga and Pilates most days – for practical health results as I convince myself that enjoyment is a frivolous goal that would not deliver the discipline; I’m studying Ancient civilisations and love the reading but am over-doing (whole also procrastinating) studying for the final semester exam due Thursday. It’s not that I don’t seek pleasure: reading is what I love most – and I read with relish. Perhaps, it’s about noticing what we actually do with pleasure (the things we don’t even notice because they are such a part of us) and to cease pining for what we aren’t doing. That’s what I’m seeking to discover.
I have just read Marion Milner, A LUFECOF ONE’S
Whoops! Just read A LIFE OF ONE’S OWN, written in 1934 but could have been written, by me if I had the insight, yesterday.
She says that real enjoyment can only come when we cease to strain, and that relaxation follows a giving up that assumes an allowing of life to overwhelm us, and that in surviving this we open ourselves to what is (rather than projections based on fears, and our apprehension of not being ‘enough’).
Not sure how much this helps when swotting for an exam, but it has helped me.
I guess the underlying question is this. Who are we serving? Our bank balance, some internalised critic or master, or, life itself (much scarier because ever changing and hard to pin down).
Better stop before I start thinking I am Mary Oliver!
And good luck next week.
Thanks Helen. Perhaps a return to A Room of One’s Own would help but not sure. Who are we serving? A life validated when tasks are checked off the list?
Eventually, with the exam it was fine – probably not my finest effort but good enough. But my essay was appreciated, so now I may feel easier again.
easier is good!