Permission and Initiative

Many people are drawn to the act of making. They want to paint a picture, sew a quilt, knit a scarf, write a novel, or throw a pot. This urge goes back to childhood, and as children we made without hesitation creating pictures, toys, stories, and songs. As adults, we are much more hesitant, and our fear holds us back. We may be afraid of not being able to do it at all, or we may be afraid that we can’t do it well. We may feel that we have no ideas or that we don’t know how to start. Unfortunately, many of us give into the doubts as we hem and haw, complain and moan about not being talented, not being good, or not being artists. These are only excuses - ways of saying that we are not allowing ourselves to make and create. So, many of us just sit idly by as if waiting for someone to tell us that it’s alright - it’s ok for us to create. And so, many of us just sit and wait and never make.

However, that urge can linger. We can feel the draw of the clay or the allure of the yarn, and it keeps pulling at us. Finally we can’t stand it any longer, and give in. We give ourselves permission to initiate something - to get started. For many of us, we look at what other people have made for inspiration. We think how great it would be to make what these other people are making. There’s a safety factor there. We see that it can be done and it has been done, so we might, just might, be able to do it, too.

Now don’t get me wrong, it’s great to be inspired by others and to want to learn from them, but we have to be careful because we can easily fall into a trap. When we look to the things that other people make, we can feel like we can only do it their way - that there is a right way and a wrong way. We get caught up in doing it exactly right - exactly like that person, and there’s the trap. Whether we follow step-by-step directions or we simply mimic the work, we give ourselves permission to copy someone else. Why? It’s safe, everything is figured out, and we don’t have to come face-to-face with our massive doubts. We started AND finished something. We made it, but we didn’t create it. We didn't come up with the idea. We didn’t develop the process or the sequence. We merely followed the recipe that someone figured out or copied their example.

If creativity is about coming up with something new that has value, how is copying someone - doing exactly what they do - creative? If we really want to step up our game - if we really want to initiate something that is uniquely our own, we need to give ourselves permission to do more than just copy other people. We need to be open to our doubts, our fears, our hopes, and our dreams.

To that end, we are the only ones who can give ourselves the initiative and permission to create.

We must give ourselves permission to:

be vulnerable

fail

not know what we’re doing

try

experiment

not be perfect

express what we feel

open up

We must find the initiative to:

get off our lazy butts

break out the tools

make the effort

trust our own ideas

learn from others

not to merely copy

accept where we are

lean into our fear
make a mess