Taking ownership of what you create is a big part of your identity and influences how you connect with true, inner creative honesty. It can feel uncomfortable if you are challenged by taking in compliments or embracing success, and equally heavy if you don’t like what you are creating in your business or life.
Either way, the thoughts about your experience are what make you “right” or “wrong”, and can quickly stop your creative flow, drying it up like a piece of jerky that’s impossible to bite through. Yet, you probably have no idea you are doing it, you just know something feels off. The challenge often comes before the solution, that’s just how it works. Until you feel the burn, you don’t know something is in need of a shift.
The kick-start in this creative challenge is more in the seeing than the doing. If you can see how your mindset is breaking your spirit, than it brings you to a choice point rather than back into the grooves of a rut.
For this week’s theme, I want to focus on how you take ownership of what you create and if you are being honest with yourself about it.
Walking the Winding Road of Creative Honesty
What you create is one part self-expression and one part self-exploration (among other things). If you are truly creating, not just going through the motions, you are present, connected and feeling into the experience of being yourself. For example, as you write a blog post about a personal experience, you dig in deeper to a challenge, yet, you are also sharing a story that may be healing yourself on some level. That’s one part self-expression, one part self-exploration. If you take a class or try something new but feel nervous because it’s unfamiliar, it’s a similar experience – you are just exploring a new aspect of yourself and what makes you tick while expressing the inner you in a different way.
This same dynamic is at work when you make the choice to dive into creative honesty. Understanding that you will always be learning about yourself in the context of your experiences provides space for you to see patterns or connect the dots from a perspective of balancing exploration and expression. When you can look at creativity as a life-long journey instead of project-based, it frees up space for you to be honest instead of just always pushing through feelings to meet an end-goal.
Instead of jumping all over yourself and dissecting the situation to rationalize it, you can simply see what transpires as another clue towards building a clearer picture between expression and exploration and connect with a great sense of creative honesty about it all.
Separating Fact from Fiction
There are countless movies that show a character experiencing life and moving through challenges and telling the story of their experience from a personal standpoint, but, you also get to see how their behavior is reflected through interaction with other characters. In some cases there is resolution, self-awareness and growth, in other stories, the character simply entertains because they continue to do what they always do.
In what areas of life are you telling yourself a fictional story? Are you able to see where you need to be honest with yourself but choose not to? Are you being way too hard on yourself so you stick with the familiar , giving yourself a built-in reason to continue self blame? Or are you taking life experiences, looking at them through a lens of creative honesty and opening up to learning without shame and judgment piled on top of it all?
The most common experience I have when consulting with clients is the story they tell me about their own creative worth. Whether they need help with content strategy, editing or more clarity on how to navigate their creative connection I listen to their story, and I love being able to show them they are so much more than the fiction they’ve created.
One of the biggest favors you can do for yourself is realize that creative honesty is as important as your dreams, goals and actions. If you can’t be clear and honest with yourself about what you really want and the value you contribute, there’s not much wiggle room for you to be in the flow to create something new that feels true. When this piece is clear, the right opportunities start showing up, allowing you to move in the direction of living in a more consistent space of creative honesty.
Need a little Creative Reflection to get you back on track? Contact me through the blue tab button below for extra support to get unstuck. If you are ready for extra support to navigate common creative challenges, check out my Mini Guide to Connecting with your Inner Guidance and Creative Fire.
Photo credit: Hartwig HKD, James Wheeler, Celestine Chua