Honoring Your Creativity As Sacred Space
What to Do When You Feel Disconnected From Parts of Your Own Story
Dear Creatives,
Sometimes life speeds up so fast it feels like we are always running but never able to catch up. Or is that just me?
The noise around can feel deafening. Especially for me, with ongoing sensory challenges from a brain injury 6 years ago.
But noise comes in many forms.
Life can be so loud that we sometimes lose the memory of what our voices sound like. We can’t even hear ourselves above the din.
It’s the loud, busy seasons like these I find the thing I need most can be the hardest to make time for… the slow, sacred practice of creating, of connecting with my being.
When I feel the memory of my voice fading, I know I need to slow things down.
Sometimes I think we struggle to find our style, our writing voice, and our creative uniqueness because we are so inundated with content 24-7.
It’s like being unable to see the stars because of the city lights.
Regularly, I have to turn off the screens, silence the notifications, and find my being again.
The place traced with inhales and exhales. Where little particles of dust dance in the sunlight. And silence soothes my soul.
Beloved, we are only made to hold so many stories.
But we have a steady stream of more worst-case scenarios, tragic events, and fearful possibilities delivered to us before breakfast than previous generations had in whole months combined.
I think we’ve normalized a state of perpetual story fatigue.
And deep, gnawing story fatigue leads to chronic disconnection and that itchy anxiousness where it feels like even your skin can’t settle down.
Have you felt that? Every time your phone dings you jump a little and wonder what now?
Too many stories can become a sea we drown in. Too much consumption can crowd our creativity.
I think that’s part of why I light a candle when I create… why I take a moment to notice the tiny flame’s movement, feel its warmth, and breathe in its fragrance.
It’s leaving a light on so the broken, dislocated parts of my story can find their way home.
It’s an act of finding the bravery to believe and trust that even the sharpest fragments of my story and frustrated moments of my being are worthy of belonging.
And every sliver of your story is worthy of belonging too.
Creativity can be a sacred space that pours strength into the core of who we are.
I wonder what might happen if we treated it as such.
Not as an item to be checked off. But an essential practice leading to greater wholeness.
What parts of your story need to find their way home? How might your creative practice help that happen?
Ha this is true for me! I had 8 doctors appointments this month and now I’m free to go to the ranch, the forest, the quiet cabin, and light a wood stove to sit by and paint. It’s been a year since I’ve gone due to a heart attack that took my
motivation and confidence away. I’m packing my watercolor stuff and then I’ll be on my way! Thank you everyone, and Michele, for one more happy day to paint. Yahoo !! 😊
Beautiful words, thoughts and art. Thank you for sharing all of them with us.