Creativity

In my last post, I wrote about anxiety, a companion for as long as I can remember. I imagine it should seem obvious, but I have just (!) made the connection between my anxiety and my creative spirit: when I have insufficient time to imagine or create, my anxiety increases. At this ripe age of 45, the lesson is, apparently, “never stop paying attention to your being because you still might learn some things.”

Perhaps this is why women seem to flourish in our later thirties, forties, fifties, and on. We start to make connections to and simultaneously honor our needs, desires, ways of thriving, and all the impediments to those that life, society, and family have erected: the expectations, shoulds, and very real responsibilities that sap us dry if we let them. But as life goes on, more and more women start to say, “Fuck this. I am tired, and I have done my damn part.” It’s liberating, albeit vexing at times; to let go, to consider disappointing or angering, to care less because you’re caring more for self. It can feel downright illicit though I suspect most of us describe our reactions towards self as selfish. Isn’t that rich?! Self-honoring as selfish. I swear y’all, women have been sold the shittiest grab bag of plastic crap.

Yes, there is entirely too much self-absorbed, self-preferencing, no-generosity-of-spirit in the world. Sometimes the social contract seems more than threadbare. But as I sit on my porch, relishing a day of breeze and birds and bugs and quietude (yes: my children have been away since 11a), it seems self-ish may be worthy of reconsideration.

There isn’t much in the way of etymological history regarding selfish. One of the earliest mentions I found was, perhaps not surprisingly, by a 17th century Protestant. Jesus, the puritanical guilt over everything. [Possibly, at that time, men experienced similar “guilt” as women, were they not “Christian” enough, but still; I am sure women experienced more. ]

Anyway, per an etymological dictionary, in the 17th C, synonyms of selfish included: self-seeking (1620s), self-ended and self-ful.” Firstly, it should be clear why I put that in quotes, beyond not wishing to plagiarize: IT HAS NO OXFORD COMMA! I was once a doubter but am now a fully-converted believer. Use the Oxford. Do you want to eat grandpa?

And secondly, let’s take a close look at those synonyms.

1. Self-seeking: could not this mean searching for a greater understanding of self? Methinks it could, and more power to the person seeking!

2. Self-ended: this sounds antiquated, vaguely sexual, and self-absorbed. This is a definite contender for an accurate replacement of selfish.

3. Self-ful: if one is not ful of self, one is, as it stands mathematically, somewhat empty. So, we could imagine that ful of self is totally self-focused. But is that bad? Could it mean that one is self-aware enough to fashion a self in part derived from Self and in part derived from identities related to others? Caring for, working with/for, in relation with/to? Perhaps self-ful could be considered as a holistic understanding of Self which includes a variety of interests and connection. Indeed, the -ful is “a quasi-suffix attached to nouns denoting a containing thing…” But is the containing vessel exclusive, or is it porous? This seems consequential to me.

Regardless, the understanding of selfish since the 1600s seems largely unchanged. I’m not here tonight to redefine or re-connote a word. I’ve had two glasses of rosé and my kids will be home soon. My point is that ugly self-absorption is not the same is understanding and honoring one’s self and one’s needs. I am never worse off emotionally than when I ignore myself. And here we can circle back to creativity and me. #selfish or #selfaware?

The pandemic has, essentially, been an experiment in forcing most people to ignore the lives they’d fashioned for themselves in the Before so as to “successfully” survive the WTF Now. In my case, the then was a tiny bit of time for me surrounded by the boys, Tom, the pets, our house, volunteering, and activism. It was tenuous, y’all. And then, a barbed sphere of profound assholery emerged, and my tenuous balance was shot to Uranus.

ASSHOLE!

I held up really well for a very long time. I am, admittedly, a high-functioning human. I’ve honed this well over decades of being judged and misunderstood and sheepish for and about my emotional self. To err is too risky; to be perfect smooths all seams.

But the hurricane, winter, Susan Fucking Collins and politics, more than 14 months straight of no school for Jack, and this girl began to crumble.

My internist: “How about calling a therapist?”
Me: “Please, what would/could that do? Nothing can change right now.”

My husband: “Do you want to call RS?”
Me: “Please, what would/could that do? Nothing can change right now.”

Some friends: “Do you want to call a counselor? Look into an anti-depressant? I have, I have, I have.”
Me: “Please, what would/could that do? Nothing can change right now.”

But you know what? Shit can get harder. So I called RS, and immediately everything was improved. RS is amazing. She is 85 years old, maybe more. She is an absolute beast of a Woman. I love her. She has white hair, is always impeccably dressed, always has fresh flowers and flourishing African violets everywhere, and has the most profound appreciation of boundaries I have EVER WITNESSED. I’m telling y’all, she will cut you off if you’re in heaving sobs and time’s up. I have learned a great deal from her.

The essential message was: “How are you tending your creative self? And how are you setting boundaries that are healthy for you?”

Readers, as you may have surmised, I was not at all tending my creative self, beyond the sporadic-yet-obsessive cross stitch session. #SoManyCrossStitchedThings And boundaries? 😂🤣

In the crush of everything, my natural inclination was, is, to jettison Me to keep everything else afloat. But that is just not sustainable, and though I seem to have learned some profound lessons at 45, others remain elusive. They remain in the realm of learned-over-decades-is-selfish versus live-well-and-Self-ish.

Yesterday, Dad and I went to the dump and unburdened ourselves of much material weight. I had lunch with him and Mom and taught Mom to sell things on Facebook Marketplace before going to Michael’s for some canvasses and gesso. Then, I returned home, kissed everyone, and set up my long-dormant easel in the backyard. I opened the art bin Mom made me decades ago: “Nichols” written in Sharpie on every brush; my glass Mona Lisa jar-with-screen brush cleaner still completely usable, including bonus solid residue from the last time I painted; an ancient jar of pink soap; a giant tube of Titanium White; my old smock; a palette knife.

To be honest, I felt sheepish sitting there, my easel and a canvas propped atop a cheap TV tray on admittedly-thriving fescue. What could I create? Who was I to make art without a plan on a sunny Saturday afternoon? There were baskets of laundry to fold, a birthday present to wrap, dinner to consider, and so on.

But, oh, my creative self: at this point just feisty embers but definitely there; pissed, tired, and in need of oxygen. So I sat with my self-doubt and discomfort and considered how much I love Hunt Slonem’s bunny paintings and how wholly Tom does not care about Hunt Slonem, oil painting, or bunnies beyond a cassoulet, and so certainly does not want to spend what it costs to buy one. I sat with all that, and then I just opened the tub of gesso and tried to recall all my years of art lessons with Ms. Melton.

I considered the strawberry soda I liked to drink and the confidence I felt in her room and the longevity of lovingly-stored brushes and paints and Lyquin and sense-memory. Afterwards, I looked at my painting of bunnies, and honestly? I was pleased. “Good” or “bad” isn’t the point. The exercise and product are.

What does it mean when we believe in what we once knew and act on that? On what we once could do and made time for?

Why do we stop doing those things and that? And what is the cost?

For me, at least, the cost is great. It is increasingly one I’m not willing to barter. Even if it takes a low point and RS to remind me of the value of holding my line.

I have always thought that artistic genius and mental “illness” are meeting points on a circle versus end points on a line. This is not remotely to say that I consider myself any sort of artistic prodigy or mentally unwell. What it is is but a reconfiguration of the denotation and an acknowledgment of the porous membrane between wellness and not. What was once selfish may actually be the self-seeking of a self-ful self. In that is plenty of room for love and compassion and care of others WHILE keeping one’s own core vibrant and alive.

In living a truest self, the possibility of isolation always threatens. Some will find your boundaries, your expression, your very being unappetizing. So. So! So? “So what!” is painful but also freeing. At least I think so, now. In this moment of delighted clarity, I urge you to go plant, paint, sow/sew, read, think, water, love, give, share and also to do all of that for your Self.

Not perfect, but whole

I'm not even going to delve into the matter of today being May 1 and I'm in jeans and a long-sleeved shirt. That seems as wrong as the fact that there are only five weeks of school left. 

It really does take my breath away that summer break is nigh. Didn't my baby just start kindergarten? And soon my big boy will enter 4th grade and approach a double-digit age?

I chose not to think of those things this week, although they flitted through my attention when my eyes wandered to my calendar and reminders for camp payments rolled in. Instead I focused on being present with myself and those around me; my boys and friends, classmates and pets. 

Recently, I spoke to a very neat woman, wise and kind. She radiated serenity, a quality in others I am always drawn to like a moth to the brightest light. I want to know that secret, I want to understand the peace in this woman's face. So I talked to her for as long as she let me.

She told me about the importance of knowing ourselves deeply. That knowledge, and the acceptance of it, pads our hearts and souls. It nourishes us and is also protective, especially in our relationships with others both known and not. 

"When we know ourselves, Emily, we cannot be manipulated, for we are already whole. We don't have to spend energy defending ourselves against unknowns [unknown attacks], because we are already aware of our attributes."

Our conversation reminded me of an Adult Development class I took in grad school. Drawing on psychologist Lawrence Kohlberg's six stages of moral development, our professor, Robert Kegan, argued that the highest stage of adult development was at the point an individual could see him/herself as the subject and any given other as the object. Intimacy and deep connection are infinitely possible, but the Self is not enmeshed with the Other.

Put differently, the Self's identity is not dependent on the relationship with the Other. Rather the Self as an independent entity can approach and relate to and with another without worry that the Self will be lost or subsumed. 

The point is this: it is wise to make all effort to truly understand the essence of who we are. Then, faults can be addressed and worked on, strengths can be honed, real acceptance can be found. In the process, an authentic sense of self emerges and can be carried into relationships.

I think it's those sorts of selves that I find so appealing. People who recognize what is awesome about themselves and what is less optimal and who embrace it all in an accepting hug. They work to be just who they are but in a responsible way, fine-tuning internally as they go.

They are not perfect, but they're whole. And outwards from that core radiates pure light.

This week, I wrote a lot. I spent hours on the couch. I felt utterly alive and yet lazy too, as if this life of fitting words this way and that were but a puzzle of leisure I've not earned. And yet, something is different, and I wonder if it's growth. The very sort that might just radiate light.