The dark side of creativity

Lately, I’ve been reckoning with something that cuts deep:

I don’t feel okay when I’m not creating.

When I’m not making something—when I’m not in the act of expressing, building, producing—I feel empty. Unsettled. Like something’s wrong.

And for a long time, I called that “purpose.” I called it “dharma.” I called it “the muse.”
But could it actually be addiction?

The act of making has become a compulsive attachment.
Something I reach for automatically—like a fix—every time I feel discomfort.
Every time I feel lost.
Every time I don’t want to just sit with myself.

And the truth is, it can drive me into the ground.
I will abandon myself for the high of creation.
I’ll override my body.
Ignore my pain.
Dismiss my exhaustion—because the rush of doing is louder than the whisper of being.

Creativity has become my savior.
My identity.
My worth.
My way of not having to feel what’s actually going on inside me.

But here’s the truth I’ve been sitting with:

If I need to be creating to feel okay, I’m not actually free.

That’s not dharma. That’s bondage.
It’s another layer of clinging.
It’s just dressed in artistic clothing.

And I know that true liberation—the kind that all spiritual practice points toward—means I have to find happiness without anything.
Without the high of producing.
Without the performance.
Without needing to be seen or validated or praised for what I make.

That’s the deeper work.
That’s the uncomfortable edge I’m leaning into now.

One of my teachers, Bobbi Jene Smith, once told me:

“You should always be able to walk away from the dance.”

That has never left me.

Because if I can’t walk away—if I’m too obsessed, too attached, too perfectionistic—I’m no longer free.
And then the dance becomes less about the dance itself and more about what I’m trying to get from it.

We all know that feeling of forced creation—when inspiration isn’t flowing but we’re grinding our teeth, trying to squeeze out a word.
When we have a massive headache but stay glued to the keyboard like a dutiful soldier.

We’ve romanticized this state—the tortured artist, consumed by the muse, devoured by their own vision.

But I’d like to offer: maybe that’s not mastery.
Maybe that’s martyrdom.
Maybe that’s a loss of sovereignty.

And maybe it’s time for us to pause.
To take a step back and offer ourselves care.
To stop letting the muse drain us like a parasite—and instead reclaim enough self-worth to tend to our own well-being.

One thing I’ve learned through illness and deep sacrifice is this:
The things we think we need to feel happy often deceive us.

Happiness is found within.
It’s a disservice to ourselves to hand it over to any transient phenomenon.

Including creative action.

That’s how Maya tricks us.
How illusion tricks us.
In the Kabbalistic tradition, this is the work of the adversary—addiction—something that manipulates our free will and convinces us we need it to feel worthy.

And it’s sneaky. Because sometimes what we’re addicted to looks like service.
It looks like generosity. Like contribution. Like purpose.

But the deeper question is this:

Is what you’re doing truly in service to your freedom?
Or are you in service to the way it makes you feel?

You have to strip naked, take the shot of whisky, and look brutally in the mirror to see what is holding you back on your spiritual path.

Maybe for you it’s not creativity. Maybe it’s some other form of distraction or happy pill.

I can say this for certain:
The empowerment comes when you prove it wrong—when you prove that you don’t need it to be okay.
That you can find refuge within.

It’s all a dream.
A temporary illusion.

A phenomena.

Make art. Love. Have fun. Do all the things.
Just don’t let them do you.

Reclaim your sovereignty.
Over and over again.

With love,
Nathan