Creativity: It's Not What You Think It Is

“The most regretful people on earth are those who felt the call to creative work, who felt their own creative power restive and uprising, and gave to it neither power nor time.” ― Mary Oliver

One of the first dreams I remember having as a child was of swimming in the Pacific Ocean. This would have been a normal thing to dream because I spent entire swaths of my childhood on the beach in Cayucos, CA. In the dream I am shoulder deep in sea water, happily dunking my head under each new wave that approaches. I hear my father call my name from the rocky shoreline. “Sarah, it’s time to come in,” he shouts. I don’t want to return to shore. My skin has acclimated to the cold water and I am enjoying the kick and flow of my own body. He calls again, this time with more energy. A large swell grows closer to me and as it nears, I can see that it is much larger than the previous waves. As it crests, I can see the light of the sun through the wave, green and gold. It crashes over my head and drags me under. I open my eyes but cannot see through the roiling sand and curls of yellow seafoam.

In my dream, I realize I’m drowning and I begin to panic. Then, when I’m sure that the sea water will fill my lungs, I feel my gangly, fighting limbs become smooth along the sides of my body. My legs fuse together into a thick warm tail, and my eyes adjust to the saltwater. I am a seal lion. Slick fur surrounds my body and my nose is twitching with an influx of new scents. I kick free of the undertow and swim away from the shore into the dark open sea. And in my dream I remember feeling a short moment of grief, knowing that I’ll never see my family again. But I also felt profound relief to finally be home in my own skin. 

I shared this dream with my Grandma Jane. I was sure that if anyone in the family could unlock the meaning of my dream, it was her. Grandma Jane (today would have been her 109th birthday) was a soft bodied, mischievous woman who loved ice cream, literature, tennis, and her piano. We met together in her sewing room, which was where she kept costumes, hats, story books, gaudy jewelry, and a guest bed. But most importantly, it was where we could talk real talk. After I told her about my dream, she lurched away and bent over the bed to fish out a book from under the side table. She popped back up and laid it beside her on the chenille bedspread. I don’t remember the title, but on the cover was a group of mermaids dragging a pretty man into the water. She flipped through the book until she found the page she was seeking. 

“Here it is. The Selkie!” she said. “This is a very old Celtic story, Sarah. The seal sheds her skin to become a woman on land, walking and living among mortals. But the day will come when she must return home to the sea. It’s a Scottish folktale!”, she said proudly. I can’t remember exactly what she said next, but it was something about how I had received a message from somewhere deep in our lineage. She explained that like the Selkie, I was a person who could move between worlds. The conscious logical realm of my father on the sea shore and the subconscious, more mystical and dark realm of the sea. This was the first time I understood myself to be an edge-dweller. A thresholder. A creative.

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I love art. It’s one of my favorite things in the whole wide world. But even more than art, I love creativity. For me, art is the painting, the play, the quartet, the quilt, the poem, and the product. But creativity is the process, the pathway, the movement, the moment, the curiosity, and the call. For some, creativity is a scary word. It implies that there will eventually be something to show for your time and effort. Probably something called “art”. I propose that while making art definitely requires creativity, creativity does not mean that art is the automatic end result. Creativity is a way of being present in an ever-changing world and honoring our relationship to that world. This blog post is about creativity. Not art.

Over the years, I’ve understood the Selkie dream to be a metaphor for my creative life. Creativity is a shape-shifting tool that calls me to release what has been and swim towards what could be. It’s a dream about process.

Creativity is a bridge that connects what I do to how I do it. The “what” can be anything, really. But the “how” is creativity. It’s how I choose to wear my clothing, how I layout the furniture in my bedroom, how I cook my food, and plant my garden, and parent my children, and write a letter. Whether I’m arranging magnets on my refrigerator, decorating my barn door with a wreath of twigs, or developing a five-year financial plan, I am making creative choices that affect the quality of my day and establish my sense of self in the world. Creativity is how I make choices and take action, which is why it lies at the root of my capacity for change-making and contributing to culture-shift.

I have always been a creative person. It was recognized in me by my family, nurtured as part of my upbringing, and held sacred by those I shared it with. In this sense, I have been very lucky. Centering creativity and highlighting its presence as a daily practice allowed me to weave it into all areas of my life and work. Creativity is like breathing to me. It's as if creativity is a system in the body akin to the circulatory system, the lymphatic system, or the nervous system. And if I don’t feed that system, it can’t do its right and proper work of keeping me healthy, connected, and thriving. 

But I know this is not true for everyone. For many of us, our creative impulse is tied up with ideas about perfectionism, worthiness and approval. Some of us are still learning to create in the face of doubt and fear. There are a myriad of things that might interfere with our innate creativity. This describes many of the people who join the Creative Alchemy Cycle. For us, the Cycle is a permissive and gentle place to practice the slow and steady reclamation of our creativity. Working at a pace that invites deep noticing and reflection is how we come back into right-relationship with our creative gifts and the world around us.

For those of you who are thinking, “Yeah, this all sounds good, but I’m just not creative,” I invite you to pause and recognize that you are inadvertently perpetuating a myth that people are somehow exempt from their innate creative gifts. Think back to when you were a child.

Did you ever talk to a plant, or a rock, or a flower? Did you ever turn your lunchbox into a bird’s nest? Did you ever find another use for your dinner plate—a frisbee, perhaps? Did you ever locate a tool and use it for something it was never designed for? Did you ever pretend you were someone else or make believe you were an animal? Did you devise a way to fool your siblings into thinking something was true or untrue? Did you ever build something without following the instructions? Then you, my love, are a creative being. No ifs ands or buts.

Astrologer and author Chani Nicholas writes, "To deny my power is to inhibit a whole host of realities from existing in the world. It’s not my place to curb the creative possibilities that want to move through me." Chani asks that we recognize the potency of our creative capacities without watering them down or refuting their urgency. 

Today, let’s hold our doubts and fears lovingly in our hands and thank them for protecting us. Then let’s set them down in a cozy place alongside our path and ask them to wait until we return. After all, their services are no longer needed here. We can always come back for them. And now that our hands are free, let’s consider what might replace them! Perhaps a pen? A paintbrush? A needle and thread? A bundle of dried flowers?

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Author and activist Joanna Macy says that "to be alive in this beautiful, self-organizing universe― to participate in the dance of life with senses to perceive it, lungs that breathe it, organs that draw nourishment from it ― is a wonder beyond words.”

There are so many ways to move through the precious hours and days we have on earth. Joanna Macy reminds us that it's all a gift. And our creative lives are the connective tissue that allow us to make meaning of this “wonder beyond words.”

So let’s wade into the water, allow the waves take us out to sea, and invite some playful transformation. Your seal-self is waiting.

Creativity isn't the cure for everything. 
Creativity is the source of everything. 

Creativity isn’t just a way to make art.
Creativity is a way to be art. 

Creativity isn't an antidote to grief.
Creativity is a way to process grief.

Creativity isn't a painting or a play.
Creativity is a path and a way.

Creativity isn't reserved for artists.
Creativity is a birthright for all.

Creativity isn't exclusive.
Creativity is permission.

Creativity isn't prescribed.
Creativity is liberatory.
Creativity is activist.
Creativity is lift-off.
Creativity is life.