Chapter 6, Committed to Self-Focus; 12 Secrets of Highly Creative Women

I think sometimes it is necessary for one to acknowledge a mistake and eat a little humble pie. sigh -- last week before I took off I left a comment on the 'Next Chapter: 12 Secrets' page using the word 'bs' about some of the thoughts put out by the author -- well there is a at least a bare minimum of 5 other ways to say something without throwing the baby out with the bath water or being disrespectful. So to my colleagues, friends, Jamie and fellow blogger's on this path please accept a heartfelt apology for my choice in expressing myself.

But, as it goes, often one learns the most from mistakes. While I was in Rocky Point for the week I had time to reflect on, the book, the author, the responses and places where I was resisting or resonating.

Marianne Williamson in “A Return to Love” speaks to our generation as one that has slipped into a barely camouflaged vortex of self-loathing. We are trying to validate ourselves through lists and lists of credentials & relationships. I went to a SARK workshop a few weeks ago and though I may have been a trifle bound up about my art and writing, somewhere through the day of listening to everyone’s saboteurs ‘group think’ happened and I started thinking I needed more help, I wasn’t enough. I got weaker instead of stronger. I don’t think this happens to everyone. I believe for me, it was because I did not know how to be strong in my convictions unless I was less than or more than the speaker. I couldn’t seem to find a happy medium and so chose the weaker side – this is always an attention getter –yes? Though I don’t think I was actively look for attention – some part wanted to be ‘more special.’ That is a gremlin at it’s core.

A workshop or seminar, guides, or book, if one is not careful, assigns someone else the charge of our mental care, they are made into the ‘fixer’ and we are the fixee’s. Think of all the self-help books from the 80’s till now. We ate them up, I ate them up, barely taking time to actually do the work I was told in one and then on to the next, the same info regurgitated in another form, but the same lesson. Still, I over-ate, drank, blamed my childhood, hid, vacillated between depression and aggression – Marianne words –“We can find a lot of different ways to express how much we hate ourselves.” I’ve done far worse damage to myself in the 30 years of self-talk than my mother did in the first 15 years of my life.

I’ve read a lot about squelching the saboteurs or acknowledging them as part of the process. My belief is they only exist if we feed them. (you know the story of the two wolves) it satisfies the ego to think we are fighting against something or learning to accept something or ‘growing.’ I think if we can’t stimulate our minds in one way we will find another. That way we are not wasting time; we are being productive. God forbid we go through life unproductive, but happy. We are so incredibly vicious to ourselves in our self-talk, no wonder we doubt, make excuses, lack faith.

After reflecting it occurred to me that none of these gremlins are actually real, they are apparitions, fictitious, and vacuous. There is not one made that can’t be unmade. (You know in the movie “Willow” when the sorcerer asks Willow what his first instinct was, and was to choose is own finger for the one of power? It’s a decent analogy if you saw the movie) A gremlin may be cute, charming even, but this is One Monster that feeds on comparison and disparagement. We lack trust in ourselves. Hence the books, workshops, seminars, (not that these can not be productive tools)

The other thing I reflected on was if I went along with the premise that the one BIG Fear could be broke down into little gremlins running amuck, unchecked all over my own mind, spewing green pea soup and turning it’s head in a circle, then wasn’t there perhaps a chance this was another form of creativity I was missing. What, I thought, if there was a window – I mean, there is a window in every prison cell of our own making? What if I’m forcing myself to take the only exit there is and though I’m scared shitless, I crawl through that window, through the dark scary, muddy, slimy, bug-infested – nope skip the bugs – tunnel. (I’m thinking “Shawshank Redemption” now – I’m clueless why all these movie analogies are coming to fore…) What would happen to my creativity, my play, my art, writing, my loves, my passions; if instead staying in the room with the gremlins I finally got tired enough of the self-abuse and I simply left.

I have a very strong intuitive feeling that my art would explode, like the frickin Fourth of July! I get the feeling the chain of production perfection would just vaporize – that’s the acid test, blowing past these hard fought for barriers, illusions of protection, that I’ve been the only one responsible for building. I really want to see me like that.

LOVE & DELIGHT!