The
past three months have been rather amazing. I’m writing again. I’m taking photographs several times a week,
and they’re often rather good. I’m
walking, a lot. (Just over 100 miles
since I set out on my “self-care” walk that I wrote about a couple of weeks
ago.) I’m being bold and proactive,
meeting people that I’ve wanted to meet for years, making decisions and
committing to things where I used to say, “Someday I should.” I’ve even started learning Spanish, because I
suspect that might come in useful when walking across Spain. In so many ways, I feel more completely alive
than I have felt in years, if ever.
Can
I be honest with you here? (I know, it’s
a little late to ask that question.) It’s
been incredibly hard. Yes, there have
been moments of near-euphoria, moments of deeply rooted satisfaction. I know, I
know, that I am on the right path. I’ve
moved forward more in the past twelve weeks or so than I had in the decade that
preceded them. And yet… There have also
been moments of self-doubt that nearly paralyzed me, days of deep melancholy, times
of depression that made me want to crawl under the covers and hide from the
world. Even in the near-perfect moments,
I’ve felt the pull of a profound sadness, as certain and inescapable as the
gravitational pull of the moon on the tides.
HUH?!? I know.
It doesn’t make sense. I am
feeling energized, empowered, and creative, even bold… and I’m melancholy? I’m battling depression? I’m experiencing self-doubt? Surely not.
That can’t be right. Not when
there is so much that is right in my
life.
I
assure you, I am experiencing all those things, and more. If you think this is odd, then know that I am
right there with you. I’ve experienced
this before. In fact, I believe I’ve
faced this emotional rollercoaster every time I’ve started to fully engage with
my creativity. Every. Damn.
Time. In hindsight, I suspect
that this has been one of the biggest reasons I’ve pulled back from being creative
in the past, if not THE biggest reason.
I create, and it feels good, and yet it also hurts, and I don’t like to
hurt, so I quit creating, and I become semi-normal (semi-numb?) again. For years, I was convinced that it was a
defect in my wiring, yet another example of how I wasn’t put together quite
right.
Lately,
though, I’ve been questioning this thought process, because the thought process
itself seems fundamentally flawed. The
basic premise I’d been working under was that I was defective, that there was
something wrong with the way I was created.
This, in turn, implies that there is a fundamental flaw in my Creator. I’ll be honest – no matter how hard I try, I
cannot bring myself to believe that my Creator is flawed, nor can I convince
myself that I was created in a random or indifferent manner. Yes, I am human, and therefore imperfect, but
I was also created with intent and purpose.
So, if this is true… then my interpretation of the cause and effect in
the relationship between my creativity and my emotional state must be wrong.
Discovering
I was wrong used to really tick me off.
Now, it doesn’t bother me as much as it once did. Much to my surprise, I’ve found that being
wrong can be incredibly liberating, especially as it relates to my
understanding of my own nature. Realizing
I’m wrong gives me the freedom to reevaluate my assumptions, to change course,
to take a new path. Stubborn as I am, I’m
discovering that it is much easier to change myself than to alter the world
around me. Over the past few months, I’ve
found that being willing to accept that I have been wrong has given me the
power to change.
So,
if this emotional rollercoaster that seems to accompany my creative awakening
isn’t the result of some internal defect, what is it?
I’m
certainly not in a position to speak on this with absolute authority, but here’s
what I’ve come to suspect is true: It is
necessary to engage with ALL the components of our emotional selves if we are
to create.
It’s
been six weeks or so since this thought really started to resonate through my
mind, and the effect on my thought processes has been dramatic. First, I was just unsettled. For years, I’ve shied away when all these
emotions started to wash over me. They
felt… dangerous to my well-being. It
makes sense that I felt this way. In
western society, we’ve developed a mindset that says we can’t be sad, we can’t
be discouraged, or feel elation, or joy, or anger. We have to be STEADY. Stable.
Reliable. The thing is, I don’t
think shutting ourselves down emotionally is any of these things. To be blunt, when we close ourselves off to
our emotions, we stop living and we succumb to entropy. As you may recall, I’m not a big fan of
entropy.
As
I started to accept the idea that all these deep emotions might not be so dangerous,
I had to ask the next question. If these
emotions weren’t an “unfortunate side effect” of my reawakening creativity,
what were they? I found that once I’d accepted the
possibility that I’d been wrong, the answer came rather easily. If this hot mess of emotions that was flooding
my psyche wasn’t a bad thing, was it possible that it was good?
In
a word, yes. Absolutely. Without question. (Okay, that’s four words, but you get my
point.) With growing certainty, I’ve
come to accept that the emotions I’ve been experiencing are the natural and
healthy energy that comes from giving myself permission to create. They aren’t a negative factor, they aren’t an
unfortunate side effect, they are fuel! It seems that when I’ve tried to quell this
upswelling of emotions in the past, I’ve been choking off the very thing that
was enabling me to be creative. Is it
any wonder I’ve had trouble sustaining my creativity?
It’s
a good thing I’ve become more comfortable with being wrong.
Now
here’s where it gets tricky. It may seem
like I’m saying that to be creative, I’m allowing my emotions to run
amuck. That’s not what I’m saying at
all. I’m also not saying that these
emotions don’t have the potential to be dangerous. As I said, they are fuel. Fuel is, by it’s very nature, dangerous stuff. The more potent it is, the more dangerous it
is. To be effective, it has to be
contained, and controlled, and used in proper measure. If you doubt this, take a gallon or two of gasoline,
dump it over your car, and light a match.
Suddenly, the very thing that was designed to give your car the power to
take you to the next town is the thing that has destroyed your car. I know, it’s a silly illustration, but I
think you understand what I’m trying to say.
Emotions
are powerful stuff. Left unchecked, they
can burn through us and leave us in ruins.
But does that mean we shouldn’t let ourselves experience them? It depends.
Do you want to get anywhere? If you
do want to move forward, then we MUST allow ourselves to utilize this
fuel. To do this, we have to learn how
to allow our emotions to flow through us and give us energy, without allowing
them to shatter us. I’m still trying to
understand how this works, but I believe that a key component in this process lies
in allowing ourselves to become more flexible, to release the rigidity of our
thinking. We have to be willing to redefine
our concepts of what is “good,” and of what is “bad.”
We
tend to think of emotions as being good or bad.
Happiness, contentment, love, satisfaction and joy get to reside on the “Good”
shelf. Sadness, discontent, anger, frustration,
grief, depression, mourning; these all get locked away in the closet, because
they’re “Bad.” I wonder, though: What if these are neither good or bad? What if our emotions, the whole lot of them,
just… are? (We’ve explored this basic
concept before. I keep coming back to
it, because I think it’s critically important.)
To take it a step further, if our emotions are neither good or bad, why do
we work so hard to experience some emotions while avoiding others?
On
the surface, the answer seems simple.
Some emotions feel good. Others
really suck. I LIKE feeling loved, but I’m
not so fond of feeling rejected. Feeling
accomplished is wonderful; mourning the death of someone precious to us, not so
much. Yes, I feel confident and rather
bold as I sit here and write these words, but I also know what it’s like to be
sleepless at 3 AM as anxiety digs its cold claws into my chest and settles on
me with all it’s weight. Like most of
you, I’ve spent my life doing my best to experience the things that feel good,
while avoiding the things that hurt.
Except…
if I’d never experienced the shattering loss when a friend died unexpectedly, I
wouldn’t fully appreciate how good it is to spend a day in the company of a close
friend. If I’d never felt rejected and
alone, would I know how priceless it is to sit on the couch with my wife,
holding her hand and knowing that I’m loved?
I don’t think so. In fact, I know
that I wouldn’t. It’s those “bad”
emotions that give depth and breadth to our experience, that give us the
perspective to value the “good” emotions.
If we want to experience life to the full, we have to be willing to experience
the full spectrum of the emotions that are built into each of us.
Over
the past weeks, I’ve started thinking of this as “Full-Spectrum Living.” It’s not easy. In fact, there are days when it sucks,
because I really don’t like feeling depressed, or sad, or discouraged. Here’s what I’ve discovered, though: Allowing an emotion to flow through me is not
the same thing as allowing it to define me.
There is a profound difference between feeling sadness and being
a sad person. I don’t have to dwell in
depression, nor should I try to cling to a feeling of elation. Why?
Because when I cling to any emotional state, I rob it of its energy.
Emotions
are meant to be experienced, and they are meant to be cyclical. It’s another reflection of that same Yin/Yang
energy that I’ve written about before. I’ve
discovered that there is tremendous power in the phrase, “This too shall pass.” If I’m feeling satisfied or joyous or elated,
“This too shall pass,” reminds me to savor that moment to the full. If I’m heartbroken or discouraged or just
plain sad, “This too shall pass,” assures me that it is a temporary state, and
that the ache is something that will move through me, and then move on. Here’s the cool part: As I’ve started testing this theory, I’ve
discovered that there is tremendous energy in this tidal flow of emotions. After a lifetime of fighting the tide, I’m
starting to move with it instead, and as I do, I am energized and recharged.
I’m
slowly accepting that the carefully controlled “safe” environment I’ve constructed
for myself is, in many ways, the very thing that has quelled my creativity. Wow.
There’s a happy thought! Like I said,
it’s a good thing I’m becoming more comfortable with being wrong. So here’s what I’m learning to do: Rather than trying to avoid or diffuse my
emotions, I’m allowing them to move through me in their natural cycles, and I’m
letting this movement carry me forward.
It’s not some willy-nilly, free-range energy. It’s something I can influence, and
channel. This doesn’t mean I’ve given
myself permission to be an ass. Instead,
I’ve given myself the authority to explore the underlying reasons for all the emotions. Sometimes, it empowers me to change
myself. If I’m angry, and I ask myself why,
sometimes I discover something I can reconstruct and redirect, and my life
improves. Other times, I realize that it’s
just the tide, and I let it pass, and my life improves. Here’s the magical part, though: Either way, my life improves! While I’m still in the early stages of this
experiment, so far it seems as though it is a genuine win-win scenario.
All
this has required me to abandon some long-held beliefs. As much as I like my life to feel safe and
predictable, I’m having to accept that a fulfilling life is not likely to be
either safe or predictable. Even if I have moments that
grant me that feeling of security, I have to remember that “This, too, shall
pass.” At one time in the
not-too-distant past, that would have terrified me. Now, I find it strangely reassuring. Better still, I’m discovering that this
unpredictable energy is breathing life and vitality into my creativity. Yes, the footing is less secure than I might
like, but it is SO worth it.