Awareness. Acceptance. Action.
Although deceivingly simple, these three principles create the foundation of any healthy creative process. Once initiated, this cycle creates a perpetual motion of honesty, spontaneity, and authenticity that springs from a deep, genuine place within the individual.
We can be aware of many things at once; emotional experiences, physical tensions, repeating thoughts, and life patterns. Awareness is the light that allows us to perceive. Without it, we would be left in the darkness, unaware of ourselves, unaware of others. This recognition is the first step to change. Bringing our focus and attention to what is begins our creative and personal work.
Sometimes when we take an honest look at ourselves, we don’t always like what we see. When we see something we do not like about ourselves, the immediate reaction may be to reject that part. Now, the ability to discern is essential. Discernment is being able to distinguish between healthy and unhealthy behaviors. But when we judge ourselves for not being perfect or making mistakes, we block the road to growth. This judgment creates one of the most fore-running barriers to our health, wellness, and creativity. Because of this, the second step of our creative process is acceptance.
By consenting to receive what is happening at the moment, we open ourselves to possibilities and change. Our whole life is a path of becoming. It is vital to accept where we are in our process. We spend an extreme amount of energy fighting and resisting our experiences. Whether it be through denial or self-punishment, thinking about parts of ourselves as being negative and unwanted creates a response of fear and shame that blocks our creative energy. This alienation clouds our most profound and intimate experiences and obscures the road ahead.
We must embrace ourselves as we are. There is no part of yourself exempt from compassion, no matter how ugly. There is no life experience too extreme, intense, or painful to live fully. Once we stop punishing ourselves or wishing things were different, we can begin to grow. We are no longer fighting our experience. Our energy is free to move into a new creative cycle. We must come to understand that to create the life we wish; we must step out of our own way. Allowing is about opening oneself. The processing of raw, powerful, and possibly overwhelming experience requires us to surrender control. This opening creates a cyclical flow of energy, and the joy of creative work begins. From this place, we take action. Not by rejecting, shunning, or hiding from ourselves or others, but with a compassionate and loving understanding that things are a certain way. We can then take decisive action to create the life and experience that we wish.
Living a healthy creative life means continually engaging in this ongoing practice; awareness, acceptance, and action. When we have an intimate connection with ourselves, our expression changes, our relationships change. Our life force moves freely, more deeply. We begin to tap into parts of ourselves that have been in the shadows. This self-exploration enables us to tap into deeper roots of expression, inspiration, and living. What is so beautiful about this process is that it never stops. Within each of us, there is an infinite well of possibility. There is always a next step, the next cycle, the next lesson. The opportunity to dive deeper and be more honest, truthful, expressive, and creative is ever-present. Moment by moment. Breath by breath.
