I'm writing, dear Creative Friends, from my garden this morning, where important ideas sometimes show themselves more clearly. I include myself as I write (maybe I'm mostly writing to myself!) although I think there may be some of you who find yourself where I do, sometimes.... or often!
We, as creative souls, need encouragement and words of inspiration to keep picking up the pencil or the brush, to sit down again at the keyboard, or pick up an instrument, or to just form thoughts into words.
Because creative expression
can be
exhausting!
That haunting voice sometimes asks, "Why am I doing this? Is it worth my time? Who is interested?" ...
I am acquainted with that voice, too.
So, here are some thoughts I am embracing today...
Thoughts to motivate and propel, rather than to paralyze and stymie. This is a little love note to me and to you about our creative pathway.
"We have been entrusted with something uniquely ours"
It is important to step out and share that special thing for good. For me, and maybe for you too, I see this as a unique, one-of-a-kind endowment. No one else (through all of time) has ever had my experiences, perceptions, or my particular voice. To suppress that, to minimize it, or to deny it is a loss ~ to myself and to others.
My faith plays into this in a big way. I am a Christ-follower, and I want to use whatever interests and skills He has created in me to the highest value. So, even when I wonder "is this worth anything at all?"
I need to embrace these realizations:
- I will be an active participant, not an idle bystander.
- I will trust that the creative spirit, which is part of my deepest self and a reflection of our Creator, matters!
- I will step out of my comfort zone, out of complacency or my own imprisonment of self-doubt.
- I will remember that even when I can't see exactly where I am going (which is most of the time, if I'm perfectly honest), that I am not finding my way alone
- I will recognize that fear paralyzes and it destroys. It harbors all that limits me.
So, let me encourage YOU, my creative friend... Don't give in! Don't give up! Don't believe for a second that your art ~ in whatever form it takes ~ is not worth the effort, because it is! It's what your soul hungers for , what others near you need.... what the world needs!
"You are the only person in this world who can express in your voice, what you see, or hear, or imagine."
Someone needs to hear it! This world needs the beauty you bring to it. Pick up your brush, plant that flowering plant, take hold of that musical instrument, move to the music you hear! The world is a better place for it!
"So, let's not get tired in doing what is good. At just the right time we will reap
a harvest of blessing if we don't give up."
(Galatians 6:9 NLT)
