01/06/2017
Just recently a friend directed me to a wonderful book “Big Magic” by Elizabeth Gilbert. She writes about creativity and the things that hold us back from expressing our creativity – in whatever form that is for us. She says that creativity amplifies our life and without it our life is small and empty and less interesting. Creativity is not just found in music, art, literature, design and dance to name a few obvious fields we associate with creativity. Creativity is about bringing into the world the hidden treasures within us in ways that are uniquely ours. Creativity is not driven by obligation but by inspiration and passionate expression.
So why don’t we all embrace our inner curiosity and creativity and freely express it to the world? Mostly because we are scared! Scared of getting it wrong; scared of not being good enough; even scared of succeeding! The list of fears is long – very long – perhaps even inexhaustible. And almost entirely not true! Most fears are just a story we’ve been told or made up and have chosen to believe rather than giving something a go. Ultimately we hold ourselves back. Who cares if what we produce isn’t perfect? If we have enjoyed the process of doing it, does it matter that we make mistakes, that we don’t produce masterpieces, or that we can’t make a living from our creativity? And how else are we going to stimulate growth and learning if we don’t lean into the discomfort of imperfection.
In coaching, we often ask the question: “What would you do if you knew you could not fail?” Gilbert suggest a deeper question is: “What would you do even if you knew you might very well fail?” What do we love doing so much that the concepts of “success” and “failure” are irrelevant? What do we love more than our fears?
So that’s the beautiful question I’m sitting with this week.
