CREATIVE WORRIES AND NO WORRIES

“Worry is like a rocking chair--it gives you something to do but it doesn't get you anywhere.” Glen Turner

In our every day desire to create we often get caught in the current of worries. It’s easy today to fall prey to such thinking with the collapse of the financial markets, elections, health care, world issues, finding jobs, paying for school for you or your child, and the list goes on.
So where do we find the time to create with all that noise in our heads?

If we are rocking away in our worries, it’s true; we are doing something but going nowhere. Why not invest that thinking into something that gives you a pay off at the end?

That’s right. Start creating. If you are an artist already than you know what that means. Get to work on that painting. How about worrying about what you are going to paint today or what colors you would like to use.
If you are a writer how about working on building those characters and let them do the worrying for you. A dance choreographer can be thinking about how to create some new steps for the dancers.


Worry ducks when purpose flies overhead. ~C. Astrid Webe

The African slaves had a way of dealing with their troubles. They created music and stories. In those stories they sang about their troubles so that they could release the pain and feel happiness. Those songs we now call “the blues”. People think that the blues give you the blues but as a matter of fact they were meant to help you get rid of your pain. These courageous people understood the deepest secret of dealing with worries in life – do something creative and expressive. So start singing your own song or one that helps you to express your inner worries and you will find that you feel much better when you are done.

If you are a musician, singer, or songwriter than grasp the moment of worry and write about it so that your “purpose” is to relieve your troubled mind. In doing so you may relieve someone else’s troubled mind too.

Worry is interest paid on trouble before it comes due. ~William Ralph Inge

So what about those of you who are worrying about your creativity or success in your creative career? How do you cope with those worries? Perhaps by becoming more interested in what you are creating than the outcome of your creation. Find the joy in doing the craft, taking the journey, and expressing who you are on the way. A reminder of why you have chosen this creative life is always a good place to start when you begin to feel the pressures of commerce and recognition in your work. Let things progress instead of pushing and take time to imagine the life you want to lead through your art. An important thing to remember is that life changes and changes you. So stay tuned in to how you feel each day so that you are not living out fears of the past or future.

My mom always says to me, “if you wait one more day something might change”. I always think about that when I start to feel worried. Every day does hold the promise of a new beginning, a new opportunity and a new direction.


I leave you with this thought:


I keep the telephone of my mind open to peace, harmony, health, love and abundance. Then, whenever doubt, anxiety or fears try to call me, they keep getting a busy signal - and soon they'll forget my number. ~Edith Armstrong