Creativity and self-destruction. Why does one seem to go hand in hand with the other? My mother was a brilliant artist. She would struggle to create the most beautiful artwork. Sometimes it would take months to create and after she would finish each piece she would lock it away in the attic where no one could see it and bury herself in a warm blanket of despair. I never got to see much of her work when she was alive. Then she took her life and I was able to see the scope of her work. It was magnificent and desperately sad.
The years have passed and I have taken my own creative path. Or should I say I have attempted to pursue my own creative path. I have always sworn to myself that I would never allow myself to become as self destructive, or self sabotaging as my mother. When I left school I was offered a production on off off broadway of one of my plays. On that day I put the work away and never looked at it again. Books remain unfinished, musicals remain without song. I see myself following my mothers path and slipping into darkness.
So here I am….in a place that I think is populated with amazing, creative people. People who I think understand these feelings. My question is, do we sabotage ourselves for fear of failure and rejection, or do we sabotage ourselves for fear of success? In the end are we more afraid our success will not bring us happiness or fear that rejection that comes from failure? Or do we somehow think we are not entitled to feel happiness and contentment?
I am asking for , begging for some clarity and any suggestions on how to get through this quagmire. I see the years slipping by, and shadows of my mother looming over me.
Creativity and self-destruction
Moderators: deer of the dawn, Furls Fire
only you know the whys of what you do lorin.
i'm wondering if the whys really matter so much.
and it seems the harder i try not to be like my parents
the more like them i become! arg.
i don't think its good to shut yourself off from your own creativity tho.
not good to deny yourself the joy of creation, even if the work reflects
inner turmoil or dissatisfaction with self.
honor your mother's legacy.
do your work.
yes its hard.
yes it forces us to be self-reflective.
yes that sometimes hurts.
yes, its worth it.
and...as my grandmother was fond of saying, "cain't never did anything, try did it all."
i mean to be encouraging here.
i'm wondering if the whys really matter so much.
and it seems the harder i try not to be like my parents
the more like them i become! arg.
i don't think its good to shut yourself off from your own creativity tho.
not good to deny yourself the joy of creation, even if the work reflects
inner turmoil or dissatisfaction with self.
honor your mother's legacy.
do your work.
yes its hard.
yes it forces us to be self-reflective.
yes that sometimes hurts.
yes, its worth it.
and...as my grandmother was fond of saying, "cain't never did anything, try did it all."
i mean to be encouraging here.
you're more advanced than a cockroach,
have you ever tried explaining yourself
to one of them?
~ alan bates, the mothman prophecies
i've had this with actors before, on the set,
where they get upset about the [size of my]
trailer, and i'm always like...take my trailer,
cause... i'm from Kentucky
and that's not what we brag about.
~ george clooney, inside the actor's studio
a straight edge for legends at
the fold - searching for our
lost cities of gold. burnt tar,
gravel pits. sixteen gears switch.
Haphazard Lucy strolls by.
~ dennis r wood ~
have you ever tried explaining yourself
to one of them?
~ alan bates, the mothman prophecies
i've had this with actors before, on the set,
where they get upset about the [size of my]
trailer, and i'm always like...take my trailer,
cause... i'm from Kentucky
and that's not what we brag about.
~ george clooney, inside the actor's studio
a straight edge for legends at
the fold - searching for our
lost cities of gold. burnt tar,
gravel pits. sixteen gears switch.
Haphazard Lucy strolls by.
~ dennis r wood ~
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Worm of Despite
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I believe what your mother did is bothering you, and I wouldn't confuse it with thinking you're on some unalterable path that must conduce to hers. We are our own people and even our parents are just a part of that self.
I have never had illusions of how hard it will be to get out there or recognized, but if you're locking it away or letting it drop down a well, then you're only hurting yourself.
My father and mother are only parts of me; I can pick and choose which parts I will, and if no parts adhere then it is my choice if they do or not. I set myself not to my parents but the previous generation, my grandfather, and even then he's only an example. Everything I am stems from one inner will, and everything around it, before it or after it can be erased wholly and a new form or change made at any time. Nothing will ever keep me nailed to this earth but my bones.
As for pain: I cannot say how this relates, but when I wrote my first novel I was underweight and by the middle of writing it I was anorexic. I stopped writing for a period of 110 pounds until I gained to 170, then instantly began the book again and finished it in the fall, a period of two years of having my ribs sticking through my chest, jogging each night, making As in college and writing a book about the post-apocalypse. I would trade it for nothing, and I would go through it all again if I were transported back. Pain forges beauty; the left hand of darkness is light.
I have never had illusions of how hard it will be to get out there or recognized, but if you're locking it away or letting it drop down a well, then you're only hurting yourself.
My father and mother are only parts of me; I can pick and choose which parts I will, and if no parts adhere then it is my choice if they do or not. I set myself not to my parents but the previous generation, my grandfather, and even then he's only an example. Everything I am stems from one inner will, and everything around it, before it or after it can be erased wholly and a new form or change made at any time. Nothing will ever keep me nailed to this earth but my bones.
As for pain: I cannot say how this relates, but when I wrote my first novel I was underweight and by the middle of writing it I was anorexic. I stopped writing for a period of 110 pounds until I gained to 170, then instantly began the book again and finished it in the fall, a period of two years of having my ribs sticking through my chest, jogging each night, making As in college and writing a book about the post-apocalypse. I would trade it for nothing, and I would go through it all again if I were transported back. Pain forges beauty; the left hand of darkness is light.
thank you both for your input. i'm going to think hard about what you both said.
I regret this post, posted during a stressful moment. Unfortunatlely Robert Lewis Stevenson said something like A word once spoken can never be recaptured. Or something like that. and there is no delete button.
ah well, sorry
I regret this post, posted during a stressful moment. Unfortunatlely Robert Lewis Stevenson said something like A word once spoken can never be recaptured. Or something like that. and there is no delete button.
ah well, sorry
The loudest truth I ever heard was the softest sound.
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Vader
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Art comes from inside. If you let it out it necessarily leaves you empty and drained. Plus "dark" emotions are the only exclusivly creative force. While positive emotions can alkso lead to craetivity, they can be used and let out in other ways as well. Just negativity can only be chanelled to become a creative force, unless you want to end up in jail. When I was still active bandwise as a song- and lyrics writer I always said "Music has to cause physical and psychic pain or else it's Muzak"
Functionless art is vandalism. I am the vandal.
Creativity allows self-analyzation. It's a purely personal journey in finding one's self through others' emotions. Why do we create? So we can feel. The poet creates with words, the musician with instruments, the dancer with the body, the mother creates life through her body. None of this would have significance if we all weren't trying to understand ourselves, and in return, understand each other.
Denying yourself creativity is denying understanding of your mother. I know this feeling. My father died last year and it's been an incredibly hard process to come to terms with. He was a highly talented musician and poet, but he never kept any of his works. I think through his creativity he channeled his pain, and I believe it was too much for him to cope with.
Parents are human. We make mistakes. We are constantly learning. We have to pretend we know everything for the sake of our children, but in reality we don't know more than our children do. Sometimes my 2 year old is wiser than I am; sometimes I have to guide him, sometimes he guides me.
I think, perhaps, you need to come to terms with your mother's death, and her depression. It is not an easy thing to do, but I think it's important. Her burdens should not be your burdens. Similarly, her fate is not your fate. Again...I know how you feel. I loved my father dearly, but he was a troubled man. He lived with such an intense amount of pain throughout his years, but he taught me how to laugh. Life is happy, life is sad, but more importantly life is life. It is living through the happiness and the pain.
Denying yourself creativity is denying understanding of your mother. I know this feeling. My father died last year and it's been an incredibly hard process to come to terms with. He was a highly talented musician and poet, but he never kept any of his works. I think through his creativity he channeled his pain, and I believe it was too much for him to cope with.
Parents are human. We make mistakes. We are constantly learning. We have to pretend we know everything for the sake of our children, but in reality we don't know more than our children do. Sometimes my 2 year old is wiser than I am; sometimes I have to guide him, sometimes he guides me.
I think, perhaps, you need to come to terms with your mother's death, and her depression. It is not an easy thing to do, but I think it's important. Her burdens should not be your burdens. Similarly, her fate is not your fate. Again...I know how you feel. I loved my father dearly, but he was a troubled man. He lived with such an intense amount of pain throughout his years, but he taught me how to laugh. Life is happy, life is sad, but more importantly life is life. It is living through the happiness and the pain.
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Vraith
- The Gap Into Spam
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Depression is both genetically and environmentally connected, so you need to find some way to come to terms with it [which isn't the same as cure, and also isn't necessarily anti-depressent drugs..for some people internet chat rooms work.] For many, these moods both inspire and alleviate until morning-after sets in Often, fear of either [or both] failure and success is not a cause, but a symptom...a symptom of the vicious circle type...it doesn't cause, but feeds the cause [and these are some of its tastiest meals, too]. At the same time, not doing something with your work due to that symptom also feeds the cause [what would you call that, a vicious mobius strip? Dessert?]
I'll tell you three things that help me. I didn't invent them, I learned them. They may or may not help you, and they require effort, which is one of the hardest things to come by, for me, in dark times.
One is, when it strikes, get out and look out. Move around and really focus on other people, other things that are not you, interact but outwards not inwards. [sometimes, just the simple act of keeping your eyes moving and consciously looking at things can make a huge difference]
The second, since you are and want to be creative: when you are in the best of moods, force yourself to create then. What you make may seem to be crap [mine does, in these chipper times] but that is partly because when one is happy, they don't need to examine happy, and they don't need to challenge the world, break boundaries, or whatever. And happiness doesn't need sympathy, empathy, understanding....because you're happy.
And you will see different things (some possibly pretty surprising). The main thing is, eventually you will find that your creativity is not dependent on your mood, creativity is dependent on creating...and creating can help the mood.
The third, once you've made something, don't ponder/struggle/analyze/dwell/judge it...do something completely unrelated for a while. Unless you're a ballerina, or advanced internal martial artist, creative work is almost purely brain work...so give it a break, do things with your body. Get drunk [or not, as you prefer] and sing karaoke. Wash the dishes and mow the lawn.
There are other things that might help, but I'm wary of advising them to a stranger...the ones above might help or not, but they are harmless even if unhelpful.
I'd have done this privately except I think the things you described are pretty common, I think everyone should know these things yet I didn't learn about them till almost too late, neither you nor I can be hurt by it being 'out there,' and maybe I'm feeling a little blue an practicing a variation of #1.
I'll tell you three things that help me. I didn't invent them, I learned them. They may or may not help you, and they require effort, which is one of the hardest things to come by, for me, in dark times.
One is, when it strikes, get out and look out. Move around and really focus on other people, other things that are not you, interact but outwards not inwards. [sometimes, just the simple act of keeping your eyes moving and consciously looking at things can make a huge difference]
The second, since you are and want to be creative: when you are in the best of moods, force yourself to create then. What you make may seem to be crap [mine does, in these chipper times] but that is partly because when one is happy, they don't need to examine happy, and they don't need to challenge the world, break boundaries, or whatever. And happiness doesn't need sympathy, empathy, understanding....because you're happy.
And you will see different things (some possibly pretty surprising). The main thing is, eventually you will find that your creativity is not dependent on your mood, creativity is dependent on creating...and creating can help the mood.
The third, once you've made something, don't ponder/struggle/analyze/dwell/judge it...do something completely unrelated for a while. Unless you're a ballerina, or advanced internal martial artist, creative work is almost purely brain work...so give it a break, do things with your body. Get drunk [or not, as you prefer] and sing karaoke. Wash the dishes and mow the lawn.
There are other things that might help, but I'm wary of advising them to a stranger...the ones above might help or not, but they are harmless even if unhelpful.
I'd have done this privately except I think the things you described are pretty common, I think everyone should know these things yet I didn't learn about them till almost too late, neither you nor I can be hurt by it being 'out there,' and maybe I'm feeling a little blue an practicing a variation of #1.
[spoiler]Sig-man, Libtard, Stupid piece of shit. change your text color to brown. Mr. Reliable, bullshit-slinging liarFucker-user.[/spoiler]
the difference between evidence and sources: whether they come from the horse's mouth or a horse's ass.
"Most people are other people. Their thoughts are someone else's opinions, their lives a mimicry, their passions a quotation."
the hyperbole is a beauty...for we are then allowed to say a little more than the truth...and language is more efficient when it goes beyond reality than when it stops short of it.
the difference between evidence and sources: whether they come from the horse's mouth or a horse's ass.
"Most people are other people. Their thoughts are someone else's opinions, their lives a mimicry, their passions a quotation."
the hyperbole is a beauty...for we are then allowed to say a little more than the truth...and language is more efficient when it goes beyond reality than when it stops short of it.
I have taken all your suggestions to heart and many of them have made a big impression. Thank you!
I am a big fan of NPR's This I believe. This was an essay I found that makes very good points.
The Importance of Restlessness and Jagged Edges
As heard on NPR's Morning Edition, June 6, 2005.
I believe that curiosity, wonder and passion are defining qualities of imaginative minds and great teachers; that restlessness and discontent are vital things; and that intense experience and suffering instruct us in ways that less intense emotions can never do. I believe, in short, that we are equally beholden to heart and mind, and that those who have particularly passionate temperaments and questioning minds leave the world a different place for their having been there. It is important to value intellect and discipline, of course, but it is also important to recognize the power of irrationality, enthusiasm and vast energy. Intensity has its costs, of course -- in pain, in hastily and poorly reckoned plans, in impetuousness -- but it has its advantages as well.
Like millions of Americans, I was dealt a hand of intense emotions and volatile moods. I have had manic-depressive illness, also known as bipolar disorder, since I was 18 years old. It is an illness that ensures that those who have it will experience a frightening, chaotic and emotional ride. It is not a gentle or easy disease. And, yet, from it I have come to see how important a certain restlessness and discontent can be in one's life; how important the jagged edges and pain can be in determining the course and force of one's life.
I have often longed for peace and tranquility -- looked into the lives of others and envied a kind of calmness -- and yet I don't know if this tranquility is what I truly would have wished for myself. One is, after all, only really acquainted with one's own temperament and way of going through life. It is best to acknowledge this, to accept it and to admire the diversity of temperaments Nature has dealt us.
Exuberance and delight, tempered by deep depressions, have been lasting teachers. An intense temperament has convinced me to teach not only from books but from what I have learned from experience. So I try to impress upon young doctors and graduate students that tumultuousness, if coupled to discipline and a cool mind, is not such a bad sort of thing. That unless one wants to live a stunningly boring life, one ought to be on good terms with one's darker side and one's darker energies. And, above all, that one should learn from turmoil and pain, share one's joy with those less joyful and encourage passion when it seems likely to promote the common good.
Knowledge is marvelous, but wisdom is even better.
Kay Redfield Jamison is a Professor of Psychiatry at The Johns Hopkins School of Medicine. She has written about her own battle with manic-depression in the best selling books, “An Unquiet Mind” and “Night Falls Fast: Understanding Suicide.” She was honored with a prestigious MacArthur Fellowship in 2001.
I am a big fan of NPR's This I believe. This was an essay I found that makes very good points.
The Importance of Restlessness and Jagged Edges
As heard on NPR's Morning Edition, June 6, 2005.
I believe that curiosity, wonder and passion are defining qualities of imaginative minds and great teachers; that restlessness and discontent are vital things; and that intense experience and suffering instruct us in ways that less intense emotions can never do. I believe, in short, that we are equally beholden to heart and mind, and that those who have particularly passionate temperaments and questioning minds leave the world a different place for their having been there. It is important to value intellect and discipline, of course, but it is also important to recognize the power of irrationality, enthusiasm and vast energy. Intensity has its costs, of course -- in pain, in hastily and poorly reckoned plans, in impetuousness -- but it has its advantages as well.
Like millions of Americans, I was dealt a hand of intense emotions and volatile moods. I have had manic-depressive illness, also known as bipolar disorder, since I was 18 years old. It is an illness that ensures that those who have it will experience a frightening, chaotic and emotional ride. It is not a gentle or easy disease. And, yet, from it I have come to see how important a certain restlessness and discontent can be in one's life; how important the jagged edges and pain can be in determining the course and force of one's life.
I have often longed for peace and tranquility -- looked into the lives of others and envied a kind of calmness -- and yet I don't know if this tranquility is what I truly would have wished for myself. One is, after all, only really acquainted with one's own temperament and way of going through life. It is best to acknowledge this, to accept it and to admire the diversity of temperaments Nature has dealt us.
Exuberance and delight, tempered by deep depressions, have been lasting teachers. An intense temperament has convinced me to teach not only from books but from what I have learned from experience. So I try to impress upon young doctors and graduate students that tumultuousness, if coupled to discipline and a cool mind, is not such a bad sort of thing. That unless one wants to live a stunningly boring life, one ought to be on good terms with one's darker side and one's darker energies. And, above all, that one should learn from turmoil and pain, share one's joy with those less joyful and encourage passion when it seems likely to promote the common good.
Knowledge is marvelous, but wisdom is even better.
Kay Redfield Jamison is a Professor of Psychiatry at The Johns Hopkins School of Medicine. She has written about her own battle with manic-depression in the best selling books, “An Unquiet Mind” and “Night Falls Fast: Understanding Suicide.” She was honored with a prestigious MacArthur Fellowship in 2001.
The loudest truth I ever heard was the softest sound.
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Khaliban
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To create is to change. To change requires chaos. The greater the change, the greater the chaos. Chaos at its most brilliant becomes insanity. Or self-destruction. Explosion or implosion. Choose your own method.
"This is the sort of bloody nonsense up with which I will not put."
Smashwords: Discovered Mate: A Tale of Desire and Chess
Some Stories: FanFiction or Archive Of Our Own
Smashwords: Discovered Mate: A Tale of Desire and Chess
Some Stories: FanFiction or Archive Of Our Own
You shouldn't regret being honest with all of us. . . I think that honesty is a big part of the creative process. After all, writing/composing/whathaveyou is all about expressing the way that you see the world and how you live in it. When work is honestly done, from that spring of the creative, it will be indeliably stamped with the things that make you the person you are.lorin wrote: I regret this post, posted during a stressful moment. Unfortunatlely Robert Lewis Stevenson said something like A word once spoken can never be recaptured. Or something like that. and there is no delete button.
ah well, sorry
I love the article about the jagged edges: this is how I feel about life. I feel I have more to say about sorrow and jagged things because I am more intimately familiar with them. And to me there are thousands of shades sadness, while one happy seems to be very much like the last happy.
Regardless, the bigger issue at hand seems to be that of fear and rejection. Locking things away or making things only for oneself to see seems to fall somehow short of what it means to create (for me at least). If I paint a masterpiece or compose an epic poem is the process complete if no one ever sees it? To me the answer is no, not fully. If I look on creation as a dialog, then I am not truly finished until my message has been received. Don't let fear stop you as it did your mother. As so many others have said, you have the choice of how you want to live your life.
I really rambled on, didn't I?
Anyhow, welcome to the Hall of Gifts, and I look forward to seeing you around here more often. 
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Vraith
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sort of riffing off what Wyldewode said...think of your post here as similar to putting your work out to people. You felt it necessary at the time and you did it. You thought you regretted it...but read what people gave you back..do you really regret it? (maybe you're still a little embarrassed sometimes, just a guess but I bet you are...but on a balance scale..was it worth it?
Something about sharing your work...(take it or leave it, just my experience)
Show it to supportive friends, take any good things they give you to heart, but ignore any criticism, no matter how well-intentioned, because those who know you well will not be able to separate the you they know from the work they see. [this can change, but you have to develop a 'separate' relationship, even if it's the same person, centered on a dialogue about the work itself, not whatever its centered on now. [it's two...two...two friends in one!]
Something about sharing your work...(take it or leave it, just my experience)
Show it to supportive friends, take any good things they give you to heart, but ignore any criticism, no matter how well-intentioned, because those who know you well will not be able to separate the you they know from the work they see. [this can change, but you have to develop a 'separate' relationship, even if it's the same person, centered on a dialogue about the work itself, not whatever its centered on now. [it's two...two...two friends in one!]
[spoiler]Sig-man, Libtard, Stupid piece of shit. change your text color to brown. Mr. Reliable, bullshit-slinging liarFucker-user.[/spoiler]
the difference between evidence and sources: whether they come from the horse's mouth or a horse's ass.
"Most people are other people. Their thoughts are someone else's opinions, their lives a mimicry, their passions a quotation."
the hyperbole is a beauty...for we are then allowed to say a little more than the truth...and language is more efficient when it goes beyond reality than when it stops short of it.
the difference between evidence and sources: whether they come from the horse's mouth or a horse's ass.
"Most people are other people. Their thoughts are someone else's opinions, their lives a mimicry, their passions a quotation."
the hyperbole is a beauty...for we are then allowed to say a little more than the truth...and language is more efficient when it goes beyond reality than when it stops short of it.