You Are as Creative as You Tell Yourself You Are

Amplify! with Karen Curry Parker

We are as creative as we tell ourselves we are.

Let's say that again because it’s so important. You are as creative as you tell yourself you are.

Find out more on how you can explore your creativity at gracepointpublishing.com

We live in a culture that has a tiny definition of what it means to be “creative.” We associate creativity with paint, passion, and pain. We think of “creatives” as those who can make things pretty, create true works of art, and transform the mundane into the extraordinary.

Have you ever had a bowl of really good soup?

Have you ever had someone look at all of your receipts and translate them into a tax return? With a refund?

Have you ever had a mechanic finally figure out what that weird noise was underneath your car?

These are all example of being creative.

We are creative because we exist. And we’re creative as a species in a way that no other species can be.

At any given moment of time, we are translating the formless into form. We are interpreting the flow of Life’s Intelligence - the Divine - and turning it into our experience of life.

And on some days, turning it into really good soup…

And yet, in spite of the dramatic creative potential that we are all unconsciously activating on a second by second basis, most of us are telling ourselves that we’re not creative.

Or we only allow our creativity to fit inside the box we’ve been told creativity belongs in.

We tell ourselves that we’ll explore our creativity when we retire, when the kids are grown, when we have money in the bank.

We tell ourselves that we’re not creative. We deny our creative contributions and label them as every day tasks instead of really understanding the cosmic genius we embody by virtue of our very existence.

Instead of allowing ourselves the dramatic free flow of self-expression, we edit ourselves. Sometimes to death. Letting our dreams die inside of us.

Your creative practice is a metaphor for how you feel about your creative power. It’s the embodiment of the story you’re telling yourself about your true creative capacity.

This story lives in everything you do, every act you commit.

You don’t have to look far to discover where you may be creatively blocked.

Here’s a fun exercise. Pay attention to how you fix and eat dinner. Do you cook yourself a healthy meal? Or do you fix something quick, out of the box? Do you set a nice table for yourself or do you eat in the kitchen standing up?

The way in which you eat dinner is a metaphor for the creative story you’re telling yourself about your creativity.

Are you valuing yourself enough to plan to prepare yourself a healthy and delicious meal? Do you allow yourself to receive the food you’ve prepared? Do you place yourself in an environment that is beautiful and sustaining?

This week we invite you to use your dinner experience as an exploratory metaphor for your relationship with your creative practice. What is the metaphor telling you? What would happen if you changed the way you eat and consciously acknowledged meal time as a way of demonstrating self-love?

Write a story about having dinner with your Muse. How would you feed her? What would you cook? How would you set the table? What would the dinner conversation be like?

Enjoy playing with these stories and then revisit the narrative you’re telling yourself about your own creative power. If you don’t like the story you’re telling, write a new one!

Make it a story that tells the truth about your creative power and the deep partnership you have with your Muse. After all, you did just have dinner with her…

May your voices gain strength. May your creative vision stay clear and strong. May your creative fire spark change in the world.

Here’s to good dinners, great soup and transformative stories!

Have a great week!