Life and the Pursuit of Creativity

Ideas have been ruminating and one of the things that keeps popping up is my desire to create s o m e t h i n g for myself. Not a painting, or a blog post, or anything like that, but something that supports my life for the year to come.

I've been pondering how to set up my Virtual Assistant business so that it supports me longer than month-to-month. How can I make real money with my art and skills? And how can I lean so far into my creativity that I lose myself and finally become who I am supposed to be? Oh but also, while still living in my current reality.

There's a lyric from Needtobreathe that defines it perfectly for me, “I have dreams that keep me up in the dead of night, telling me I wasn't meant for the simple life." That lyric has always resonated deep within me. In my own scenario, the simple life is the one where I absentmindedly neglect the things that make me feel alive and instead succumb to the “American dream” with zero work-life balance.

And so it goes, every night when I am trying to fall asleep, “a million dreams are keeping me awake.” The Greatest Showman anyone? It may sound silly, but it's also so true. 

I find myself reaching over the bed in the dark to grab my phone, praying the brightness is already at it's lowest setting before I open it up and type all these swirly desires into my notes app. Another night, another set of thoughts. I know better than to expect I'll remember the profound things that came to me in an epiphany right before I close my eyes. I've lost so many brilliant ideas that way.

According to this article from the World Economic Forum, we are most creative right before we fall asleep. This honestly explains so much about why I always feel more creative and fired up at night.

When I think back to my desires my biggest hurdle is that I don't have anything concrete to navigate towards. I don't have any real agenda of what I want to accomplish. That I could do. That is easy. That is a goal that I can chip away at. But all I have are feelings. I know how I want to feel but I don’t know what it’ll take to get me there. It's this learning what I even want to make the goal that I'm struggling with.

So again, without any real agenda all I know is that it's my soul's desire to create create create and so I’m going to follow that gentle — okay, sometimes aggressive — nudge. Bad art, things I make just for me, experimental creations that are totally ridiculous. I don't want to care about how it impresses anyone else. I just want to play. 

Last night in my notes app I typed, “I want to be so lost in creativity that friends wonder where I am.” 

No more waiting to feel invited, included and filled up with the company of others to feel my best. I can do this on my own and I need to.

I can almost see her, with her tote bag filled with her journal, watercolors, snacks (ofc), and a camera, exploring the places that fill her up. After all, she can't be lonely when she has her creativity.