Cindy asked, "I don’t understand what you mean by self care and
the creative life being synonymous.  As Ricky Ricardo would say, ‘Splain, Lucy!’"

I wrote an article awhile back that talks about this; the article begins:
Self-care and creativity are best friends  – one cannot exist without the other.  Yet we don’t often think about befriending, romancing, caring for our creativity.  Instead we:
•    Compare our writing to others (I’ll never be able to write like Barbara Kingsolver so why bother?)
•    Raise the bar (I said I would write for 15 minutes and I did but you know, Toni Morrison writes for longer that 15 minutes and so 15 minutes isn’t good enough and I’ll never amount to anything and…)
•    Fight with our work (Story, if you would just do what I want you to, we wouldn’t have any problems.  I hate you story!)
•    Indulge in shadow comforts to soothe away comparisons and self-criticism, and to ground our energy. 

My core belief is creating is life.  To create is to be alive, is to learn, is to grow – anything else is choosing a slow death.  We must create and the more we do it with intention to connect and express Spirit / God / Life, the better.  Self-care is the act of taking care of our body, mind, and spirit so that we can best and most joyfully create.  At it’s most vital, self-care is removing the barriers of self-doubt, self-loathing, energy drains like shadow comforts, and more draining or dangerous addictions, etc. so that our creative energies can manifest fully and serve the world.  Self-care can also create courage and tenacity so we can continue to be creative, because the center of gravity in our culture is not about creativity, it is about numbing out. 

I chatted with Sonia Choquette last week for an article I’m writing for Body+Soul and she said a couple of very helpful things about this subject:

"Change agents (the subject of my article and what I think all creative souls are) look at the situation, and respond out of the energy of their spirits by asking, ‘What can I make new from this situation?’  Rather than what can I do to return it to the old or this isn’t my responsibility or simply detaching."

and

"The ego mind wants everything to remain the same as does the sentimental mind but the spirited mind sees that all things are temporary and all things are change so it goes with the true nature of the universe- creative change!"

Finally, I adore and totally relate to what Sandy wrote in the comments to my last entry: "Those of us who operate only deep within the right brain are moved by the *idea* of taking care of ourselves in
the same way we get excited about our ideas for creative endeavors, but our limited use of left-brain tactics tends to undermine our follow-through on both…

"Here’s the sad thing: I immediately respond to the article’s suggestions with a knee-jerk, gut-level feeling of ‘Don’t tell me to do things your way, you left-brainiac!’ (Sandy, me too!)

"…And yet…my novel remains unfinished and my exercise needs remain unmet."

Here’s what I know: the mature part of me, the adult in me, knows that developing some proficiency in all quadrants or ways of relating/being in the world, is in my best interest, which brings in self-care again;

• I will support myself by not beating myself up for having a hard time with details or computers or filing or Quicken
• I will support myself by dropping the story that "this is just the way I am and I can never change"
• I will support myself by doing things that are not easy for me (details, marketing, difficult phone calls) when I have high energy (mid-morning usually)
• I will support myself by hiring people who have strengths in the areas I don’t (Thanks Deb!)
• I will support myself by checking and double checking myself in certain areas of my life
• I will support myself by recognizing that my weaknesses exist- not denying them.

Thoughts?

Related posts:

1. Comments on not Writing
2. More Commenting Comments
3. Commenting on Comments
4. Two Comments and an Idea
5. Comments