Creativity is such a personal thing, a unique, individual expression of your deepest self shaped by life experiences, desires, hidden patterns and areas of healing. It’s this personal self-discovery process through creative acts that builds you up, tunes the creative voice and exposes your soft spots, showing you where the biggest areas of growth and joy can be found as you explore your path.
So in this very personal process, why do we often look for others to validate our creative worth, to define it for us when that is what we are here to discover? How can another person possibly know what’s valuable about your creative expression without walking in your shoes or connecting with your source of inspiration?
They can’t. But other people can help reveal deep desires within you and areas of growth or imbalance that are difficult to see without someone there to reflect it back to you. So instead of comparing, you can take what you notice and use it to CREATE something.
Creative worth is infused and collected in the doing. The result of a creative act is the cherry on top – it’s the physical manifestation of an internal process of emotion and sense-of-self expressed outwardly. Sometimes a spark of inspiration never shapes into something tangible, but that doesn’t mean it isn’t valuable or worthy of acknowledgement. It’s yours and yours alone to enjoy and relish, and that’s all the validation required. You just need to be willing to acknowledge what you create is valuable in the same ways you would for someone you respect and admire.
The External “High-Five” Only Validates Half of the Picture
While it feels fulfilling to have others recognize the value and beauty of what you create, you won’t be able to honor and receive that recognition, really take it in, if you don’t feel validated by the act of creation itself within your own heart.
Learning to see and value your own creativity is like a boomerang. As a child you start out creating all the time, no judgment. Then you slowly learn to react to praise or the word “no”, then start seeking approving looks or avoiding disappointed faces. As you grow into adulthood, you continue this path until you realize what is true and false for you. These interpretations of other people’s reactions do not define your creative value. It’s time to leave them where they belong – in the past. The sooner you do the freer you will feel, the more grateful you will be naturally and the more in alignment you will be with the non-judgmental creative voice you had when you were born.
Even though the act of someone else reflecting back to you what they see as your creative gifts can help you connect with something within that you don’t see as valuable yet, it doesn’t magically make your acts of creativity valuable. They already were the minute you created them.
Shattering the “I’m Not Creative” Myth
Creativity is the act of bringing something into being that didn’t exist before for you, whether it’s through your work, playing in your free time or out sheer necessity to improve your life. This broad definition covers quite a bit of ground, which means you can’t “opt-out” by saying you aren’t creative.
If you truly don’t feel creative or identify as having a talent or aptitude you view in that way, please take this moment to firmly plant both feet on the floor, stand up straight, take a slow deep breath… and then let it go. Keep doing this one simple act over and over when you feel that way of thinking creep in or when the creative side of yourself feels miles away.
This one action can help you slowly and mindfully release this way of thinking and shift your mindset to the present – the true space of allowing rather than searching. Creativity is discovered when you leave enough room for it to show itself, not when you chase it’s tail.
The little things you do without thinking – redecorating a room, fixing your car, writing a love note to your sweetie – all creative. The more you can see your behavior as little acts of creativity, the more confident you will feel, opening up even more awareness to your own creative flow within.
It’s time to validate what is already happening in your life every day, naturally. So I say three cheers to all the projects that never get a “high-five” from someone else or make it off your computer, for all the long nights, multiple versions and loving attempts laying in your junk drawer, and all the half-baked ideas yet to come. They are all part of you, a valuable step along the path to connecting with your creativity and sense of self – and they deserve heaps of validation.
Looking for extra support as you reconnect with your creative self? Looking for a little intuitive guidance to get you to the next level of what you are meant to really create? A Creative Reflection Reading can help. Not sure what you need but want to get started? Check out my Mini-Guide for Connecting with your Inner Guidance and Creative Fire.
Want a little more from the blog on this topic? Check out Trying to Measure your Creative Worthiness? Stop it!
Photo Credit: Pawel Uniatowicz, Nic Redhead, Bart