Creativity as a tool to survive and then thrive

Creativity is one of my three core values here at Damsel Not In Distress. I had a wonderful conversation with Bec Forde of the Vibrancy Society recently, which she has turned into this beautiful podcast episode. Beautiful because she had a wonderful way of drawing more out of me, so that I now appreciate even more clearly how vital creativity in all its forms has been on my healing journey.

What exactly IS creativity?

Firstly, she asked me for my definition of creativity. That really got my cogs turning, because nobody had ever posed that question to me before. Here’s what I came up with…

Creativity is all about bringing innovation and flexibility into our thinking and how we express ourselves.

As such, I see two buckets of creativity. The first is what most people think of – expressing ourselves, our ideas and our emotions through various media such as art, writing and music.

The second might not seem so obvious, but I believe it’s really critical – creative problem solving, by which I mean finding new solutions by looking at a problem or issue through different lenses and from a range of perspectives. This is a huge part of what scientists do in their research, which people think of as being firmly the realm of logic – and yes it absolutely is, but it is also the domain of incredible creative problem solving, without which our lives would be much the poorer. I think also of my time in the UK civil service helping to shape policy – again, at its best, that is all about finding creative solutions to a whole panoply of issues facing society.

Logic is incredible, and it has its limits

And so, in fact, in this way logic and creativity are very much intertwined. However, the logical part of a person can often be much more prized in this age than the creative part. I found this growing up – people did encourage my creative side up to a point, but often only because I was pursuing my logical capabilities to the max, which is what people saw as the key to a successful career. The other reason my logic was often more appreciated was that people found my creative side a bit more complex to engage with, especially given the associated high sensitivity and strong emotions which have always been a core part of me.

I will always extol the praises of logic and the scientific method, because they are incredible tools which have equipped and enabled humanity to understand the world around us and improve our health and wellbeing in so many diverse ways. Where we can use logic to help us make a decision or solve a problem, I absolutely think we should!

And yet the application of logic has its limits. Even scientific innovation needs a good dose of creativity, as my definition above aims to capture. And sometimes, logic can only get us so far.

Take big life decisions such as where to live, who to share our lives with, or which profession to pursue. There are likely to be logical elements we can bring to the table, but logic alone is unlikely to be able to bring us to a decision point. We also do well to harness creativity and intuition – our inner knowing – to help us answer these big questions.

Creativity can help us survive during a storm

There are so many ways in which creativity supported me during the darkest periods of my life storm.

There were songs which spoke to me of a hope and healing which I could at that stage only dream about. But the fact that other people could articulate these things so wondrously allowed me to borrow some of their hope.

There were films which spoke to me of people triumphing over seemingly insurmountable adversity. My absolute favourite has to be A Beautiful Mind, which told of the tumultuous and ultimately uplifting life of mathematician John Nash.

And I tentatively started journalling at some point in my early 30s, although I don’t think I would have called it that at the time. Journalling is simply writing about one’s thoughts and feelings. But here was the thing…to begin with, I just didn’t have a true voice of my own, so all the standard journalling techniques were pretty much lost on me. The ironic thing was that, much though I was well capable of being eloquent and confident in important work meetings, I couldn’t find that same verbal flow when it came to my private life.

But somehow, I haltingly found ways to borrow from other people’s creativity – copying down quotes and song lyrics and poems which particularly spoke to me deep down. Looking back, I can now see that this practice helped me to begin to journey gently towards discovering the true version of me which had been so scarred and submerged by the storm I had endured for so long.

Here's a pic of me and my journals from over the years...

There is no doubt in my mind that other people’s creativity, and my own willingness to lean into that creative realm of life, were pivotal to my successful storm navigation.

Creativity is also key to Singing After The Storm!

Creativity can do so much more for us than simply helping us to survive. It can also be a key component in enabling us to thrive at the other side of our storm.

My business would be pretty dry without creativity!

It all started with my business name – Damsel Not In Distress. A different spin on the classic “Damsel In Distress” trope, where a beautiful princess generally confined to a tower by some malicious power needs to be rescued by a dashing prince. But here’s the thing. While I do have my very own gorgeous prince, he didn’t actually rescue me. He certainly supported me every step of the way, as did some other wonderful people in my life. But ultimately, I rescued myself – actually, nobody else could do that for me, however much they might have wished to, having understood the truth of my situation. So there you have it, I am a Damsel Not In Distress – and you can be too!

Then there’s Sing After The Storm. I could have simply talked about “thriving after big life challenges” – but I wanted to paint a more vivid picture, which helps my clients to properly appreciate how the life storm they are experiencing is so similar to being out unprotected in a physical storm. Using that metaphor activates different parts of our brains, allowing us to visualise and grasp the truth of our situation in a new way. And that same metaphor also helps us to observe our story rather than being enmeshed in it – which is a powerful enabler to help us start to take steps to lead ourselves out of it.

I have realised that the next big step I can take to support my thriving and growth is to give myself more spaciousness in my day-to-day life. I have often used busyness to keep myself afloat – as long as my brain was busy doing something productive, it couldn’t dwell on the horrible stuff that it just wasn’t ready to contemplate. Even now, having journeyed so far through my storm to the other side, I’ve realised that I haven’t quite shed that propensity to want to be busy …it’s that protection I created for myself all of those years ago, that safe space where my brain was preoccupied with something meaty all the time.

The problem is, if my brain is constantly tied up doing things, there isn’t any space for me to roam gently and tap into that carefree, creative, free spirit which dwells inside me. That free spirit which is always available to me, but which will shy away if it sees that I am engrossed in “more important” things.

So now is the time for me to be more willing to spend time in quietness, without a to-do list, in the void where I know from experience that the creative magic happens…

Creativity is for everyone!

Some people are convinced that they don’t have a creative bone in their body. Maybe that’s you.

Or maybe you think you’ve stamped on your creativity one too many times, and it can’t be revived any more.

Well, I’m here to enthusiastically fly the flag for creativity! Everyone has it and we all express it in wondrously diverse ways. This has nothing to do with quality of output, and everything to do with what the process bestows upon us just because we show up for it. And that same process often gives generously to other people around us as well.

I don’t believe our creativity can ever be smothered to death. The embers are always there, ready and willing to be revived if we’re willing to offer them metaphorical oxygen – that is, love and attention without expectation and without demands, but with hope and belief that creativity is a worthy pursuit in its own right.

And I firmly believe creativity belongs in the workplace. Organisations, just like humans, are fuelled by creativity and are much the poorer without it. And yet from my experience there is often not much space available at work to nurture the creative process…

A massive thank you to my wonderful creative teachers and mentors – you know who you are!

So, there you have it. I truly believe that everyone can massively benefit from tuning into their creativity as they navigate their life storms.

And all in all, I am supremely grateful to all those teachers and mentors who saw the potential of my creative bent early on in life, and cultivated it in me – particularly the art teacher who could see beyond my watering can badgers… If you want to know what on earth THAT’S all about, grab a cuppa and have a listen to my chat with Bec…!