To Live Is to Dream
Week 11 of the Artist’s Way course for recovering and building creativity
Last week, I wrote about Week 10 of Julia Cameron’s Artist’s Way course to build creativity. If you purchased the book and are following along, I hope this past week was fruitful. To the rest of you, I invite you to join in and comment how the course is helping (or hindering) you in your lives!
In Week 10, we addressed the excuses we tell ourselves to prevent us from creating. I used my early social gender transition as an example of keeping the river flowing, improving consistently, and discarding the need to create great art (or a great makeup look) with each attempt.
Interestingly, when I wrote the section about fame and competition, I had just received more recognition than I had in my life. I was struggling to come to grips with the possibility I might be gaining traction as a writer and as a woman.
It took all week to understand fame is fleeting. I had to reassert my purpose as a writer - that I began writing not to be famous or to get rich, but because I must. I had a story to tell about my transgender experience that I wanted to hear, regardless of any other interest.
Week 11 was just what I needed to read. This week, we consider our purpose - to create because a complete life requires it, not because it pleases others. Week 11 moves beyond protecting our right to be creative and focuses on owning our creativity for its own sake.
Week 10 recap
This week in The Artist's Way was boring and predictable, and I liked it! I wrote my Morning Pages every day, like a good girl should. I went to a coffee shop and read my book on Thursday afternoon, the way I've found works.
One day this week, however, I waited until evening to write Morning Pages. In the moment, I felt it worked out well, because I received an email that day which upset me greatly (I intend to write more later this week). Having Morning Pages to write anyway, I took out my disappointment there. I was grateful for my journal.
The experience reminded me how I moved from writing when upset to writing as part of my process. I wrote previously that three pages was good, because I had to get everything out of my head to fill the space. But I also sometimes stop at three pages because I'm "finished," even if I'm not done. This experience reminded me to use my journal the way I have for years as well as for Morning Pages. The Artist's Way - it's not just for breakfast.
I create because I am
Week 11 of The Artist's Way course is titled "Recovering a Sense of Autonomy." The autonomy Cameron implies is not to derive independence from art, but to learn to divorce our value as a person and the value of our art from financial success as an artist.
Fashion changes on a daily basis. Our belief in our art must not. Art is to be created because it needs to exist, not because it fits the fashion of the day. To be clear, we all need financial stability to survive, and we must be willing to create with or without financial gain.
Obviously, if our art sells, we may end up with beautiful material goods. If it does not sell, we may not end up with material goods...but we will still have the art and the experience of creating it. Our personal reward in the act of creation is worth the effort.
Cameron insists the effort we invest into our art is an end in itself. Self-respect is derived from the act of creation, not its salability. Creating art is the lubricant necessary for the rest of our lives - when we create, life runs smoothly. When we are blocked, life is difficult, we are crabby, and we sink into depression.
As a source of self-respect, our art cannot be compromised, and certainly not for other people's comfort. Being what others want us to be likely ends with us hating ourselves...and hating others for their expectations.
I accept who I am
In my allegory of the transgender experience, I can attest to the power of other people’s expectations leading to self-hatred. When we become the means for another person’s end, neither person benefits.
The short-term benefit of external expectations may keep a transgender person in line...for a while. But resentment builds up. Expectations begin to feel unfair. Soon, other people and their expectations are rejected, at great cost both to the transgender person and others.
Cameron writes we must stay on our path, not any other path. We create to reach our potential, to fulfill our dreams because they are our highest potential. As Cameron states:
To kill your dreams because they are irresponsible is to be irresponsible to yourself.
And what if I succeed?
In keeping true to our dreams, we will create art. Great or small, we create. But we cannot stop there. We cannot rest. We must always move, always expand, always grow. After we complete one piece of work, the obvious question is "Now what?"
To wear a well-worn cliché even thinner: art is not a destination; it must be a process. We commit to creativity for life. Without continuing to move - perhaps to improve - we stagnate. Nothing destroys a creative spark like halting its use.
But the act of creativity is not a map. We don't know the roads we will travel, and the landscape changes as we traverse it. Art must always change in response to the last piece of work. When we complete one piece, we have enough knowledge to throw out all we knew before we begin the next.
The final wisdom of Week 11 is to keep moving - that is, to exercise! In keeping our body in motion, we give our minds time to rest and rebuild. Movement aids in mental health. And being in Nature adds to the effect. As we find our soul in art, we soothe and nourish ourselves through physical movement as well as spiritual. We must move in order to keep still.
So what's next?
Here’s a shocker - I’ll be sticking with Morning Pages and the Artist Date. They work, and I know it. I intend to take time out to write in my journal when I need to as well. I will disabuse myself of the idea that I only get three pages to write!
Those three pages - while a victory for that day - do not indicate the end of my artistic endeavors. I must push further and find the next plateau. I may even try to find plateaus in real life! There are benefits to living in the foothills of the Rocky Mountains.
This week, I commit to opening the floodgates of my creativity. I will not create because I should, I will create because it’s what I do. I will open myself to my true nature - to be an artist.
Until next week!