The Burden of Creativity

By nature creatives turn themselves into quasi manic depressives, when ideas flow there isn’t a much purer feeling. But when we fall short, or lack entirely the ability to produce anything of meaning, which happens more frequently than not, life can become a bit hallow, even if for an afternoon. 

Part of the issue lies in the pressure we apply to ourselves, wrapping our identities and in many cases self worth in the cloth of a “creative” everything then rides on the act of creating. A creative that cannot create isn’t really much of anything it seems. 

When ideas fail to appear on paper the dread that they may never again surface sets in. A rational person might look from the outside and say “but they always do” and they would be right, but artists tend to be less rational to begin with. There’s also something poetic about allowing ourselves to slide into the abyss. Seemingly most of the great ones were depressives, addicts, or a bit out of their minds right? 

I’m not sure if it’s even a winnable battle, maybe one we only make progress towards by occasionally stumbling into something great, the way some walk the beaches every morning combing through fragments for the one unblemished shell.  

Even in his later years Picasso created work he disliked, despite being told it was brilliant by those around him simply because he was Picasso, therefor anything he did must be brilliant. 

With such a set of circumstances, what are we to do but push through, scrape and claw our ideas into existence. Muddle through the mediocre knowing more might lay just a bit deeper, not because we want to, but because we have to. We find the valuable in ourselves by looking, even if it takes time to present itself. Knowing buried somewhere in the sands of our consciousness a thought worth something is waiting to be pulled from the waves.