In case you need permission to disappear for a bit

It’s Sunday morning. I have nothing to do until 2 pm. Just an easy morning with my family. Maybe a dog walk. Maybe some gardening. Space. Chill.

I came to write about creative rhythms. About “creative hygiene,” and the pressure or pull to be engaged with the world, to be visible and producing. And how those pressures and pulls, and our seductive devices, can lure us to the places we surely mustn’t be when trying to create something that takes bravery and grit.

When we’re facing the making that will only clarify and come through if we can roll around within ourselves for a bit, unassaulted by all the creations of others for a hot minute, long enough for us to meet the muse, play whack-a-mole with our creative defences, and court art’s agency through our chosen craft.

I wrote an opening paragraph that I was sure I’d cut. Just lubricating the page, you know? And then I opened my phone and replied to a few texts. Before I knew what was happening, I was sending memes on Instagram.

I came back and mused on some other things. Then Facebook was open in my browser. Who did that? I hate it there. There were messages I replied to, and before I noticed what was happening, two hours had gone by. Two hours of writing that wasn’t writing at all. It was attention-hopping.

Very unsatisfying. Restlessness started to hit, and I thought I should pause and investigate what’s happening. And wouldn’t you know it, the pattern was this…

I’d write a thing. And then there would be a moment, after the period, before the writing of the next thing, when I didn’t know what I was going to write yet. Not writer’s block, not deep wrestling with words or trying to get anything profound or confounding on the page. Simply a moment of the unknown. Would I describe this moment as one of tension? Or boredom? I don’t even know because I didn’t stay with it long enough to investigate.

I think it’s these moments that sabotage…oh my, it just about happened. Okay, so this is becoming a real-time meditation, and I’m just going to tell you about it.

I almost bounced away from the page again. Why? Because I didn’t have the language for what’s being sabotaged. It’s not far away, that language, it’s right here, but a small beat of uncertainty, where I had to look for it, almost turned into me picking up my phone, clicking through some apps, and ending up watching a comedian’s bit that’s so sharp I feel envious, nom nom nomming on terrible news and researching if that cute onesie is a drop-ship scam all at once.

If I just stay, what happens? I can explore what leaving would have sabotaged.

When distraction and consumption are readily available in the same place as the creative work we’re trying to engage, and we bounce to them in a moment of boredom or uncertainty, in a moment of frustration or self-doubt, we’re sabotaging…

• The capacity to hold our attention in discomfort

• Intimacy with the thing we’re working on

• Creative tension that can lead to very satisfying output

• Creative resilience

• Self-inquiry and self-awareness

• Finishing the damn thing

When I have that impulse to flit away, if instead I just go back up and read what I wrote, it gives me a mental break, but doesn’t context switch (which dilutes everything). Or if I turn my attention to the part of my body where the impulse to flee is, and I stay with it, I settle back into coherence. These are small moves, but ever more necessary when there are no barriers to digital fast food that will give the dopamine hits that staying in creative practice doesn’t.

This moment-by-moment mindfulness asks me to stay in the creative cave, session by session. But this is the micro-practice of a macro phenomenon I’m trying to wrestle myself into. I want to feel myself contained by a larger creative cave to hold what I’m trying to bring into form.

I’ve been working on something. A new show of sorts. Not in the medium of the last show. It’s taking longer than I want it to. I almost said it’s taking longer than I planned, but my planning was based on fantasy, not actual scoping, so I’m right on time.

I’ve already given myself permission to disappear for a bit, to drop into the creative cave. But when I hit the bumps and the boredom, the fear disguised as confusion, I jump out, I read or watch other people’s stuff. I lose contact with myself. The potency of my creative impulses dilutes, and if it’s a day my energy is already low, I can spiral into one of those who do I think I am, I have nothing to offer, everything is so noisy, why add to the noise kind of moments.

I’ve learned that I get the most satisfaction from making (and am less attached to the outcomes) when I can go really far in. At first, it’s just having the space to follow the inspiration without knowing where it’s leading. Eventually, there will be enough in there that I can see the shape of the world I’m building. What’s ideal for me is to stay in that space as long and as often as possible, to be consumed by it.

The project I’m working on is specifically about platform growth and visibility. Perhaps it’s ironic that I need a minute to disappear. But when I imagine the life I most want to be living, it’s one where I grant myself large swaths of time to be in a creative cave. If I’m going to feed a machine, it can’t be at the expense of my own soul.

So if you’ve been feeling like you just need to drop away for a bit, and you needed a sign or a permission slip, take this one. And if you feel like telling someone about it while you’re cave-dwelling, I’d love to know about it. I’m a fervent cheerleader.

With Love,

Chela

PS - If you’ve been musing on (re)designing your website, your brand, your body of work, my friend Cristy just opened her book for new clients. Cristy designed my website like some kind of magical oracle. She designed the entire homepage without any direct input from me. It blew my mind (and made the process soooooo easy). She has a talent for seeing the soul of a person, their art, their offers, and the needed architecture and visual transmission that captures who they are and where they’re going. If you’re interested, inquire soon. It’s the first opening she’s had since August and will go fast.