MANAGING CREATIVE ANXIETY

The practice of managing creative anxiety – fear, resistance, and blocked energy – is ongoing work for artists. It never really goes away. But we can get much better at managing it. When we are empowered with knowledge and understand the creative cycle, we’re then prepared and informed to meet what arrives. We know what we can do to shift our energy and get moving once again in our work.

This is the dance of creation – and you are your own choreographer, and your own creativity coach.

Often the times we feel most challenged to manage our creative anxiety are when we are facing some kind of external pressure with our work – like preparing a body of work for an exhibition, making a painting for a juried show or competition, or commission work where we are working to someone’s criteria and requests.

For most of us, the challenge at these times is that the external pressure causes us to spend much-too-much time in our thinking state – trying to figure things out and get it right. We begin to focus too much on these external concerns, and lose connection with our authentic expression and intentions for the work. 

The brain loves solving problems and will latch on to that opportunity whenever it can –obsessing and ruminating in its attempt to figure out what has been planted there by us. Creative anxiety arrives as a result and we are locked up. The work suffers, and so do we.

To do our best work we need to have a balance between the thinking, discerning mind and the playful, loose, explorative, intuitive working state that we find so juicy for our art-making.

We need to be able to easily move between these two states and recognize which one we’re in, so we can make a shift at any time. We need to remain mindful as we approach our work and utilize everything that we know to assist us in navigating the dance of creation. 

Am I over-thinking? Is this the right time to reflect and assess the work?

While recognizing that even with this new understanding around creative anxiety, the habits are still present, and the fear and tightness arrives. In those moments we just need to notice what is occurring for us, catch it and reframe our experience – turning our thoughts towards a more supportive internal narrative. We become sensitive to when we’re triggered and we do what we need to do to move through any resistance we’re feeling and towards our creative work with the right energy. And, that right energy is being curious about our experience and compassionate towards our struggles. 

What is your experience with creative anxiety? What do you do to help yourself to shift that energy to something more helpful for you and your creative work? 

This short version blog post is a part of my Mindset Moment series, an accompanying edition to my bi-monthly blog post. My intention for these Mindset Moments is to speak to some of the common challenges artists face with their creative work, and how a mindset shift can make a difference.

They are short reads, with a suggestion or writing prompt that you can work with…as well as an invitation to join in the conversation, sharing your experience and insights.

You can join the conversation by leaving a comment under this blog post, or on my social media posts. Thank you for sharing your thoughts with me, wherever you find me.

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