The inherent worth of your unique creative process
I meet with a new 1:1 client, a skilled and deeply interesting neurodivergent poet who recently left a challenging higher education experience. We talk about the difficulty of maintaining one’s authentic vision in a neurotypical world, let alone in most traditional classrooms.
Words like “misunderstanding,” “fluency,” and “translation” get used throughout our conversation, each more than once.
She describes what she knows about the work she wants to be making, and we spend some time being curious together at the edges of that knowing.
She describes what she knows so far about her strategies—the stuff that works for her, lets her tap into inspiration & healthy obsession, and what “momentum” tends to feel like in her body-brain. We spend some time daydreaming about what comes next.
I pick up on only a small amount of resistance—this based purely on what I can see & emotionally sense, and informed by what she’s disclosed. The resistance does not surprise me given her recent academic experiences, and the way her authentic reality was not encouraged, neither on nor off the page.
We establish that, regardless of whatever benchmarks her classmates and teachers had been using to assess creative work, these are no longer her benchmarks. In reality, they never were.
“My homework,” I offered, “is first of all to practice using the strategies that you already know work for you.” So often, we do have good data about ourselves, we just need help remembering that it’s there.
“When you catch yourself assessing your writing based on someone else’s benchmarks, try to notice what’s happening in that moment.” At the level of thought, feeling, and bodily sensation: I asked her to notice, with precision and neutrality, what happens when comparison arises during the creative process. I did not demand that she try to avoid it, only that she aim to study it.
“We’re just gathering data here,” I reiterated.
And she was on board…mostly. This work is hard. Just because something better / richer / less masked is possible does not mean it won’t be tremendously challenging to get there.
And. Just because something better / richer / less masked doesn’t yet feel possible doesn’t mean it isn’t waiting for you on the other side of time, nourishment, and rest.
~~~
“There are two things I want you to practice knowing,” I told her, and here I’d like to offer them to you as well:
The way you desire to write is valuable.
And the way you desire to write is safe.
No matter what your writerly voice is like; no matter what your creative impulses are; and no matter what kind of vision you’re called back to again and again: These two things remain true.
When you think, sense, use language, or process meaning differently than others, it’s easy to forget that your ways are objectively as valuable and safe as the more normative ones.
This isn’t about the external challenges we may face in a world that doesn’t always understand or make space for our differences, let alone value us. This is about you—your inner world and your creative integrity. This is about internal safety.
It’s about what you want to create, and also about how you want to create it, and the fact that both are inherently good.
Safety + value. The next time you sit down to write, set these words like bookends on either side of you. They are not ideals, but anchors.
Like this:
safety → you (worthwhile) ← value
What I want you to know today:
When you choose “safety” and “value” as your anchors, you are asserting the worthiness of both your process and your voice.
Because the pursuit of your authentic creativity is worthwhile, friend.
