Many of us, as we became sick, put our creative selves aside. Recently two book titles by Beth Pickens, caught my attention - “Your Art Will Save Your Life” and “Make Your Art No Matter What,” and reminded me of the importance of creativity in the healing process.
Willie Nelson - “I think I need to keep being creative not to prove anything but because it makes me happy to just to do it…I think trying to be creative, keeping busy, has a lot to do with keeping you alive.”
“What you make doesn’t have to be witnessed, recorded, sold, or encased in glass for it to be a work of art. Through the ordinary state of being, we’re already creators in the most profound way, creating our experience of reality and composing the world we perceive.” Rick Rubin in The Creative Act: A Way of Being
Creating merely requires a subtle shift of mindset. How we make our bed, can be art.
How we choose to express ourselves in an email:
Thank you for the lovely invitation. I’m unable to participate, but hope you have a wonderful time.
Courtney
or
No.
Courtney,
is art.
Whether our art feels undermethylated (orderly),
or feels overmethylated (expansive),
or feels undermethylated with an artistically slow COMT or MAOA,
it’s all art.
How we go about our healing journey,….that’s art too. When I was sick, art sustained me. I began collecting scraps of paper that caught my eye. I had no intention and no experience with “art.” Soon putting the pieces of paper together gave me a place to put my limbic system,……that otherwise had my thoughts landing on things to be afraid of, including my body with it’s growing list of strange symptoms.
As I got sicker (from mold and EMF) I went into survival mode. I put the art aside. My limbic system had “more important things” for me to do, like spending hours online with stress inducing research (and high EMF). I was hunting for answers - not just going down rabbit holes, but digging endless interconnected tunnels. I was in search of that elusive endpoint…the one where I’m fixed, restored…completely and,…of course,… forever. As my left brain created more stress (and yes, found some helpful answers), my right brain knew, as Albert Einstein said, “Information is not knowledge.” My right brain knew that I couldn’t heal as long as my left brain was running the show. Einstein also said:
“The intuitive mind is a sacred gift and the rational mind is a faithful servant.We have created a society that honors the servant and has forgotten the gift.”
How easily I had forgotten the gift. Eventually I realized, that to heal, I had to get in touch with that part of me that wasn’t sick.
Art teaches us to trust the process, roll with uncertainty, know that the answers will present themselves when we’re not looking so hard. I think this spiritual fortitude, and the neuroplastic rewiring for it, can be learned and practiced though the creative process - any creative process.
Art resonates with us individually - teaching us what we like and don’t like. It can teach us to “follow the energy.” I like order and color. My mom does too.
Whether we’re doodling, humming or creating a meal, art puts us in our body. If you find it impossible to sit quietly to meditate, consider making something with you hands.
Not the least, the creative process teaches us to be present, so we can listen to the quiet voice inside - the one that’s so very eager to speak to us.
“Art” can move us beyond the latest functional medicine topics and gurus to inspiring artists, musicians, comedians, thinkers and writers. One of my favorite writers at the moment is Austin Kleon, whose “10 Things” inspired this newsletter.
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A pleasure to read and learn more. Thank you. My undermethylated self thought you might enjoy knowing the complete Einstein quote you referenced:
“The intuitive mind is a sacred gift and the rational mind is a faithful servant. We have created a society that honors the servant and has forgotten the gift.”
Thank you perfect timing