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Why Did The Creative Life Choose Me?
Whatever the reason, I’m deeply grateful and exploring that here.
I have some amazingly creative friends. My wife can crochet and knit anything she sets her mind to. I’m on a Discord with a group of talented sci-fi authors. One friend does amazing leather work. Another friend does beautiful papercut art. I have friends who make gorgeous glasswork, pottery, clothing, calligraphed and illuminated scrolls, hand-wrought chairs and boxes, and more. I’m surrounded by creatives.
Many are hobbyists. Although a lot of them could do something professionally with their art, they choose to do it on the side. I can relate to this. Recently, I started to get things together for my own woodshop, since that’s a creative hobby I sometimes indulge in (and would like to do more).
But the creative life, working as an author/authorpreneur? I believe that this is my calling. The creative life chose me. As I have been working on what author Steven Pressfield calls “Turning Pro”, I feel more and more that this chose me as much, if not more, than I chose it.
Everyone has creative abilities
The world of creativity is vast. It takes on many sizes, shapes, colors, and forms. While we tend to look more closely at authors, painters, actors, sculptors, and the like, that’s but the tip of the iceberg. Creatives are more than just artists.
Every entrepreneur is a creative. How else can you take an idea and turn it into an enterprise? Scientists are creatives. How else can you study and research an idea to gain a clearer, deeper understanding, invent a vaccine or a more efficient microprocessor, and the like? Chefs are creatives. How else do you combine unique proteins, starches, herbs, and spices to develop delicious foods?
That, however, doesn’t cover everyone. And everyone has creative abilities. Often, though, you overlook or disregard them. The mother who figures out how to make her baby laugh instead of cry. An office worker who utilizes a new tool for an old process. The coach inventing a new game plan. A teacher working lesson plans around the endless testing cycle. The gardener watering an especially fussy plant. Creative abilities lie in everyone.
No, not everyone can pursue the creative life. That’s because it might not choose them, nor they it. Yet making space for creativity is important. When you don’t create, you stifle your imagination. That can lead to disempowerment, and there’s more than enough of that from outside sources around the world.
Why did the creative life choose me?
I have a lot of scrambled, convoluted memories of my childhood. The reason why is unimportant. Yet one thing that stands out, something I do remember clearly, is that my parents always encouraged my creativity.
They took me to see Star Wars the summer before I turned 5. I’d already been developing a deep love of outer space and sci-fi. I remember sitting at the large window in our living room, imagining commanding my starship. There were afternoons I developed wild new storylines in the Star Wars universe, playing with my action figures and vehicles. One swing on my swingset was my starfighter. Endless sticks were swords and laser guns.
I started writing when I was 9. In Middle School and High School, I sang in the choirs, acted in the plays, and worked behind the scenes building sets and student directing. Also, I dabbled in mock trial, speech and debate, and cooking.
The creative life chose me, I believe, because creating is where my joy lies. Hence, it’s no surprise that all my attempts to work “normal” jobs requiring little to no creativity always went poorly.
It’s still a work in progress, and Resistance often smacks me around. Yet, the creative life chose me, and I have been fortunate that I could choose it.
Mindfulness and choosing the creative life
I cannot deny that I have the blind good fortune of a degree of privilege. The inherent luck of having been born cisgender male, white, middle-class, suburban American isn’t lost on me. Because of that, I strive to share ideas, paths of empowerment, and to be a good person (especially in the face of some of the truly awful people making so much noise these days).
Perhaps the creative life chose me, but I am able to choose it, too. Still, I strive to create things to help and benefit others. My nonfiction writing is all about sharing ideas, empowerment, utilizing conscious reality creation, mindfulness, and tools that everyone has. The fiction I write hopefully opens and entices the imagination of the reader.
My goal is to work within the creative life to help better the world while being my most empowered, grounded, balanced, and centered self. Yes, I’m going to screw up, get it wrong, have lousy days, fail, and so on. That’s life, whether the creative life or otherwise. Nobody lives perfectly. Everyone is perfectly imperfect.
I firmly believe that the meaning of life is simply to experience everything about life. The highs, lows, joys, sorrows, and everything in between. The creative life chose me, and I work hard to respect that and make the most of it. And I am endlessly grateful to have been chosen by the creative life, and to have the opportunities that I do.
Thanks for reading. As I share my creative journey with you every week, please consider this: How are you inspired and empowered to be your own authentic creator, whatever form that takes?
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