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A busy brain stifles creativity, ya know!The writing I’ve been producing the past few months has been a long time coming.
I’ve had this knowledge in me, locked away behind walls of fear, self-doubt, comparison, you name it. Then there are the cascades of executive functioning blips, that can make thinking feel like trying to see clearly in a snowstorm.
I gave more bandwidth to masking than self-acceptance, and consumption rather than creativity.
My inner critic developed laryngitis trying to keep me safe. It sure kept me afraid.
Like many of us, I spent years, and energy reacting to the noisy world we’ve created.
Chasing this, running from that. Constantly wondering whether I’m good enough.
You say you can’t think about trying something new because you’re too busy, too much on your mind, and so on.
What’s the truth, is your life busy or is your mind busy?
Is your life busy because you’re trying to calm an anxious mind?
How many of your +/- 60,000 thoughts per day are about good/bad, right/wrong, should/shouldn’t?
You know, all the conditioning that controls your behavior so everyone else is happy.
There was a key insight that helped unlock the ability to calm down, and open up to more creativity.
We often talk about wanting to quiet our thoughts or calm our minds, but this is only half the story.
What we know now is that the work isn’t to calm your mind, it’s to calm your nervous system.
Scientists have determined that 80% of all nerve signals don’t originate from the brain, but from the body.
So if there’s anything you need to calm down, it’s not just your mind, or your body, it’s your entire nervous system.
Your nervous system reacts to everything, in conditioned ways. It’s difficult to feel in charge of your life when you feel controlled by your triggers/conditioning.
I had a conversation with my boys this weekend about PTSD. My oldest is majoring in Social Work, and is studying childhood trauma in one of his classes. We talked about some of the difficulties they’ve experienced, including when I divorced their mother.
When you’re too young to mentally understand what’s going on, the experience doesn’t simply pass you by.
Your body still has an experience, whether or not your mind can make sense of it. Your body will be triggered by reminders of that event (e.g. sights, smells, sounds, etc.,) even though your mind has no idea what’s going on.
Having grown up with ADHD, Autism, Dyslexia and so on, none of which was identified or accommodated. I grew up feeling unsafe, and in the way. It’s been hard work, much of which I hope to spare you by sharing what I’ve learned.
Step by step, you learn to remove one pebble at a time from the path you’re on. In time, the path becomes smoother.
The pebbles become exceptions instead of the rule.
Creativity is vulnerable, curious and risky. We need to clear the path of pebbles so your creativity can flow more freely.
Will you give yourself permission to do the work?
