I’ve been in a bit of a rut and had writers block for a while – written a few unpublished blog posts, maybe just as a release for myself?! This won’t be a preachy post on ‘balance’ because the truth is, I’ve certainly not found it and wonder if it’s obtainable at all. Is it even healthy to feel the steady level of ‘good’ all the time that we strive for? Seriously, is that even in our nature? The beauty of humans – especially women is cyclic behaviour, bringing wonderful strengths and challenges that make us grow and keep the world spinning. (Please read Lisa Lister’s Code Red if you do anything in life).
I’m a creative, all over the place, sparking ideas in my sleep. Organisation and structure don’t come naturally to me and have always been what I find challenging while running a business. (Enter Laura, new genius PA). For a long time I tried fighting this and have almost been ashamed of some of these attributes, certainly at school! These ways of being aren’t embraced in our social system, leaving like minded people feeling ‘not good enough’ or rebelling in any way they see fit – instead of being taught to play to their strengths. I can tell you now, every time I’ve tried to dull down moments of creative madness, exciting impulsive ideas or hold down a 9-5 to seem more stable and ‘normal’ it’s killed a little piece of me and I’ve not created any artistic magic, not to mention feeling flat in day to day life, being a worse version of myself.
What I want to talk about is something I HAVE learnt; being responsible for playing to your strengths, determining what it is you need to make you tick. I have a long winding cycle of feeling insanely inspired and motivated, having an enormous amount of work flooding in, handling that work (those bookings, seeing clients etc etc) then waking up in the middle of juggling it feeling a little lost, like I’ve lost my spark – and not sure why.
It takes a bit of soul searching to get back to feeling creatively-alive again but the cycle is becoming clearer.
It’s not easy for any of us. I honestly don’t know how we juggle working, parenting, holding a relationship down, staying fit, tryna cook healthy food, socialising and being ‘mindful’ at the same time (all the eye rolls). It’s bloody hard living in an era of ‘no switch off’ yet seeing pressures about ‘switching off’ around every corner of social media. What the hell are we supposed to be, or do?!
Just ourselves, is the only answer. And it’s vital to find your tonic to achieve happiness and sanity.
For me, it’s artistic ‘playtime’. I have a danger of getting lost in too many clients’ ideas. It’s so important as an artist to not get clouded by the art your being asked to create by clients and loose touch of your true style and having time to purely express that for no reason other than therapy and enjoyment.
So this is a reminder, or even an introduction to some people, to find what makes you click in life. If you’re feeling flat, don’t look at what you’re doing wrong or what you don’t have – look at what it is in life that makes you tick and enjoy yourself. The key to our happiness often isn’t a material object we ‘don’t’ have or being 9lbs lighter. The ‘I’ll be happy when…’ mentality has to stop. We’ve been trained to focus purely on ‘goals’, and live a task-orientated life, when really we need to feed the deeper part of ourselves at times to remind us we are human, life is for enjoying and when we feel alive & inspired we’re much glowier human beings in all other areas of life.
Does this makes sense to anyone else?!