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Creativity, Compassion and Self-Hate - Part One
"Good is the enemy of Great." - Unknown
Hello everyone. This is the first in my new series of musings and riffs on creativity/innovation and what it means to be a 21st century human, to accomplish what I call "living in the paradox" -- the paradox of remaining grateful for who we are today, while simultaneously striving to be even more creative, fulfilled, and productive tomorrow.
I am glad to be back with you and hope you find these explorations intriguing. I offer these ideas as a kind of thought experiment. Lets explore. Today I want to discuss Compassion, Self-hate and Creativity.
It occurs to me that there are two kinds of self-hate, each of them with the power to destroy our creative endeavors, and certainly our happiness. The first kind is the one we all discovered in our experiences with support groups, therapy, or working with the Artist's Way and/or the Artist's Way at Work: the judgmental voice in our heads that we call the Inner critic - the critic that will attack our ideas, our dreams, our creative actions...
... We might also call this voice the Schoolyard Bully because it questions our right to exist with such attacks as "WHO DO YOU THINK YOU ARE?" or "YEAH, RIGHT." or "BULLSHIT." This voice is our body's natural defense against risk-taking. And though it tries to protect us, it actually blocks our growth by masquerading as the voice of reason, pointing out our limitations, prior failures, disastrous futures -- limitations, failures, and futures that are more often than not IMAGINED.
For instance, we might decide to start a new business, learn to paint, return to school. Immediately the voice starts comparing us to some imagined ideal scenario that we do not fit, judging us as too old, too analytical, too uneducated, too whatever. This kind of condemnation is a subtle and insidious form of self-hate. The solution to it is DATA and FAITH. We counter our inner critics with the facts and defend our right to a life we love based on our spiritual connection as part of the magnificent mystery.
Whenever our critic questions our resolve or ability, we set it straight, fast. And just to piss it off, we take some small action to get right back in its face. We say something like, "So what if I have to write 10 screenplays to sell one, even the best writers have to do exactly that!" And then we sit down and write a scene, even a bad scene. The act of creation is what is important, not the quality of the action.
We must allow ourselves to have "happy failures" as we learn each new skill, attempt to improve each of our passions. We ALL fail along the way toward mastery - that is why they call it PRACTICE. Expecting perfection from ourselves is also a form of self-hate, one that us from our center, our confidence, our joy at creation.
Yes, sure, we want to become great at what we love. We want and need to strive to improve our efforts, but DISCERNMENT is different than CRITICISM. True and constructive discernment means evaluating MY efforts today with MY efforts yesterday. Not comparing myself to the world's greatest in the field.
And disputing our critics does not mean that we blow off the important knowledge or practice of our field. Of course we must master the domain in which we work, and there will constantly be times where our ambition exceeds our skills, that is what makes life fun and chaotic and vibrant. So, there are times for reflection and comparison to some extent, but that is not in the beginning of our creative efforts, and should always include a healthy dose of self-acceptance.
I realize that many of you getting this email are already known for what you do, and I applaud that dedication and accomplishment, but aren't there always new levels of challenges, even at the level of world class mastery? There is a respected theatre actress in New York named Sharon Sharth who is known as an actor's actor, a stage purist. Sharon says that the times she loves most on stage are the times when someone makes a mistake and throws the whole cast into a state of chaos, forcing them to invent the next moment, second by second. This is the beautiful time of creative expression, when there is no time for thought, or self-conscious criticism. Why shouldn't we strive to make our practice times as edgy?
The point is, self-hate expressed as harsh judgment blocks the joy and excitement of creativity, especially when our internal dialogue is a fantasy about problems or criticism we MIGHT encounter, someday, maybe. Accepting an imaginary future criticism is a form of self-hate, living in the past is a form of self-hate, living in a state of psychological pathology (as when we describe ourselves in narrow psychological terms such as "I am depressed... a borderline... a narcissist... a drunk... etc.)is a form of self-hate.
We all have an innate creative spirit, and this creative spark is independent of ALL labels that we might attach to it or to us -- including movie star, genius, CEO, author. Success is not a promise of self-love and it is true that many successful people are driven by fear and loathing.
No need to judge yourself for your inner voices, just be aware of them, and remember to take a small action on behalf of your dream, whenever they offer their extreme opinions, be it outlandish praise or belittling criticism.
We will continue this exploration of creativity, compassion and self-hate next month.
All the best,
Mark Bryan
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