Adapt to Survive; Create to Thrive

Reflections on wellbeing for creative professionals and all of us as creative beings

Last time I wrote about creativity, I ended with a reflection on ‘create to thrive’ as a step up from ‘adapt to survive’. I was thinking about the impact of loss of connection and stimuli on our creativity during lockdown. Now that we’re emerging back into collective spaces, with arts venues reopening and shared experiences back on the menu, it seems like a good moment to ponder how we might get to that ‘thriving’ place, with creative juices flowing and means of expression available.

Perhaps it seems frivolous to be focusing on creative expression when so many people around the world are very much in survival mode (whether that’s due to the impact of Covid, climate change, conflict or all of the above). But we’re inherently creative beings, with imaginations capable of dreaming up works of art, nation states, complex stories and solutions to problems – this stuff is fundamental. Having an outlet for our thoughts, feelings, ideas and struggles has a proven impact on our health and wellbeing. I’d advocate for everyone having some form of expression – getting emotions, thoughts, ideas and challenges out of our heads and into the world somehow is a powerful therapeutic tool. It might be through talking, writing, singing, drawing, moving our bodies or making physical objects – the medium isn’t important, but the act of creation is.

Given the power of these forms of expression, it makes sense for me to argue for access to the arts for all; for supporting the performers and creatives whose livelihoods (and creative outlets) have been decimated by a global pandemic and years of funding cuts by right wing governments; and for us all to view creative expression as an essential aspect of a healthy society. I only have to look at how the reintroduction of visiting musicians to my gran’s nursing home changes the energy of the residents to remember how much we need the arts.

Revisiting my expectations of my energy, creativity and social connections after lockdown, I’m struck by how unrealistic they were. I’d felt for so long like a coiled spring, waiting to be let go so I could bounce into the air, releasing all that pent up energy. The assumption was that I’d be ready to leap into action, connecting with as many people as I could, and suddenly finding myself able to create again – writing, singing, dreaming up exciting new projects. In reality, I’ve started see people, jam with my band and attend events in person as much as I can, but I mostly don’t feel inspired and exuberant so much as a bit tired. The fog is lifting, and my creative energy is gradually reigniting, but it’s a slow burn, rather than a big bang. I wonder how many people are feeling the same way right now, and in particular, how all those who make art or perform for a living are faring as the need to produce to deadlines and fill up the performance calendar reappears. I wonder what support creatives might need in order to get fully in touch with their most inspired, energetic selves and fall in love with their craft again after a hellish year-and-a-half. Community, advocating for more health-promoting working practices, and offering accessible help to those who are struggling seem like good considerations to start with. Our creative industries need their workforce to be well, and there is much to be done in order to address some of the less healthy working practices and dynamics at play within them. For those of us who aren’t directly connected with these industries, there are many ways to support the makers of the various forms of art that enhance our lives. We can buy from local artists, musicians and makers, attend performances (whether live or virtual), amplify, share and credit the work of artists we come across… and we can be mindful that, in spite of the old adage ‘choose a job you love and you’ll never work a day in your life’, creating art and performing is harder work than it might seem.

For all of us, whether or not we consider ourselves ‘creative’, there are many ways to support our own wellbeing through creative expression. For me, creativity and connection are inextricably linked – I find that connecting with others, with nature and with my own mind and body helps to put me in the right headspace for creating and coming up with new ideas. After a retreat where I’ve spent a few days breathing, walking through fields and woods and connecting with others, I’ll often sit in the garden and find songs, stories, blog posts and ideas for projects seeming to just appear on the page of my notebook before my conscious mind has a chance to start asking questions. Everyone will have a different creative process that works best for them – if you don’t yet know what that looks like for you, I’d suggest a few small practices to get your senses and imagination going… Carry a notebook and jot down any fleeting thoughts, ideas, observations as they arise. Go for a walk out in nature and pay attention to the colours, sounds, smells, shapes. Sing in the shower. Sit down and write for five minutes without stopping. Doodle while watching TV and build on the doodle until you’ve filled a page. The beauty of this is that you don’t have to be ‘good at’ any of these things for them to be of benefit. Expanding your perspective beyond the mundane and routine can help you to feel more optimistic and come up with innovative solutions to problems. That’s why, during this time of re-emerging into the wider world, I’m advocating for all of us to to find ways to ignite a creative spark that will help us to thrive.

By Mo Ford

Picture credit: Tim Mossholder via Unsplash.

Creative blocks, pandemic pressure and space to ‘just be’

Remember all that time ago – it seems like a thousand years – when we first went into lockdown and so many of us promised ourselves myriad ways to stay entertained, distracted, productive and creative? In reality, our most important task was to avoid contracting or spreading a deadly virus, but the shadow of our hyper-capitalist society backed us into a corner, deafeningly whispering “to be worthy, you must create. You must produce”. The desire to resist this notion and the need for creative expression have formed an interesting conflict in me. Or at least, it seemed to be a conflict. But coming to terms with permission to ‘just be’ and a need to turn thoughts, feelings, pain and things that can’t be expressed any other way into some kind of artform are not mutually exclusive.

I distinctly remember thinking a few years ago about all the things I’d be able to do, if only I had the time to slow down and really focus on them. Throughout my life, I’ve always had multiple projects on the go at any given time – while this has slowed considerably since my mid-thirties, I have it on good authority that others still consider me to be busy, energetic and ‘always doing something’. Clearly, this has never been less true than in 2020. Of course, I’m not alone here – we’ve all had to slow down, clear our social calendars and move around in the world far less than we’re accustomed to. But as for my fantasy of how, if forced to stay home for an extended period of time, I’d play my neglected piano until I was at least as good as I’d been at seventeen, I’d write a whole album (or at least an EP), I’d learn a new language, I’d finally get serious about playing guitar, maybe I’d even write a BOOK… well, it all remained in the realm of the fantastical. For balance, I will admit that I did go foraging for wild garlic and cooked more than I have done in years, I recorded duets with my wife and sent them to my gran at her nursing home, I blogged and I planted herbs and vegetables. Yet somehow, the simplicity of these acts didn’t feel like ‘enough’. I suspect that this is where that shadow creeps in and threatens to corrupt the concept of creativity. It wants more – bigger, faster, more impressive.  

But what happened to the creative spark that I somehow assumed was just lying dormant, waiting for long, languid days before rising to the surface? This side of a second lockdown and close to a year into the pandemic, such an assumption seems faintly ridiculous. And now that I think about it, the times when I’ve felt the most imaginative and full of ideas, emotions, flowing words and energy have all had a few themes and circumstances in common. These include intensive, collective experiences of breathwork or other modalities that let me process ‘stuck’ emotions and get into my body, the ecstatic energy that comes from dancing in a crowd to live music at a festival, bouncing off a bandmate’s energy in a jam session, listening to the infinite wisdom of my ‘coven’ friends around a fire… these are some of the moments when I feel most alive and most creative. So, it should come as no surprise at all that this year, when almost all of these experiences have been postponed or at least significantly changed, my creativity doesn’t feel quite as juicy as it may otherwise have done. Having said that, there’s something encouraging in this reminder that my creative spark is fed by connections with others (even if the actual ‘creating’ part needs a little solo time and space to ignite it).

I also find it interesting that it was at first so easy for me to discount the fact that I’ve metaphorically birthed a whole new entity – a limited company, which somehow feels so much more real and tangible than the model I was operating under before. Perhaps I was a little worried that creating a company with a director and corporation tax was somehow feeding that shadow beast. And yet, it remains an act of creativity – going from idea to action, feeling passionate about specific issues and seeking to address them. I’m fascinated by the intersection where ideas, passion and creative flow meet the world of work and business. My own experiences, and watching the experiences of high-profile performing artists from afar, have led me to want to be part of a movement that advocates for artists to have a voice, rather than be silenced or even abused by those with mainly commercial and self-aggrandising interests in mind. Perhaps seeing things through this lens is what leads to the ‘ick’ factor for me when I think about the meeting of creativity and industry. But without the arts and all the roles and industries behind them, where would we be? A whole other blog post, series of posts, book could barely contain all there is to say about the impact of a pandemic on the creative industries and the political decisions that threaten to bring the arts that sustain and distract us, and that help us to express ourselves, to their knees. So maybe that’s a subject for another day.

My main takeaways from this moment of reflection are as follows. Firstly, while aphorisms about how it’s okay to ‘just be’ abound on inspo-gram posts and a whole genre of assorted merchandise, there’s an element of resistance about permission to step off the hamster wheel. Maybe that permission and that easing of pressure to do more is a good first step in unblocking whatever it is that’s stuck. And this may never be as pertinent as it is during a pandemic where we’ve been forcibly slowed down (key worker jobs notwithstanding). Secondly, creativity – at least, for me – requires input, inspiration, a stimulus. Sometimes, that input can be the expansive feeling of connecting with the natural world, but just as often, it’s sparked by connections with people. Having come to this realisation, I’ll be seeking out more opportunities to get together with other humans to see what we can create. If this crisis has taught me anything, I hope the lesson that sticks is not to take things (or people) for granted. And finally, it’s worth unpacking what we might mean or assume when we think of ‘creativity’. On some level in my mind, a hierarchy has set in – as if I’m only ‘doing it properly’ when writing songs or stories, for example. In reality, we are creative beings by nature, and under the right circumstances, we can apply that spark to anything we do. It’s fair to say that the circumstances have been less than ideal lately, though I’m encouraged to see the incredible things that artists are continuing to produce. ‘Adapt to survive’ has that vaguely dystopian, Darwinian flavour to it, but when we’re feeling secure enough at survival level, perhaps the next step is ‘creative to thrive’.