(Originally posted on LiveJournal)
There was some discussion the other day on coppervale’s (James A. Owen) LiveJournal about those who get discouraged from following their creative impulse. I’m afraid I posted rather baldly about how no amount of encouragement is going to change the attitude of someone who has given up on his or her own creative impulse. I did not mean to imply that someone cannot change their outlook themselves – because I do believe they can. But I really don’t think those who have Decided to Stop can be turned around simply by warm encouragement.
Uncertainty is one thing – “Am I any good at this?” “Will anyone other than me ever want to read or see this work?” “Will I ever get better at this?” Those are all the questions of Uncertainty, and they are not necessarily bad questions, or (even more importantly) crippling ones. The questions acknowledge that one has obstacles of various sorts in front of one, in pursuit of the creative arts. And it is wisdom to acknowledge those. But it is also a very different thing than the Decision to Stop.
There are a lot of things that can go into a Decision to Stop. Ridicule and cruel critiques can certainly contribute to it. Those are harsh things to encounter and difficult to get beyond. The artistic temperament is by nature sensitive, and it is therefore vulnerable to the power of negative responses. It is the paradox of creativity: to be able to create anything at all, the artist (be it writer or painter or sculptor or musician) needs to be sensitive – to the artist’s own emotions, to the responses of other humans, and yet, in order to survive and learn to trust one’s own creative impulses, the artist also needs to learn how to have a thick skin to criticism, how not to be hindered or crippled by harsh responses.
Not everyone manages to find the balance between the sensitivity and the thick skin. There are those whose sensitivity is such that they cannot bear the reactions of others, especially the harsh ones. To protect their souls they let go of the activity that brought that pain into their space — giving up on the creative activity. There are those who develop such thick hides that no amount of criticism can ever touch them again — but unfortunately, they also frequently lose touch with their audience and cease to be effective artists, ending up writing only for themselves.
Somewhere in the middle ground are those who have learned how to nurture and shelter their senstivity without losing that boyant drive to continue to create. Some do it by ignoring negative criticism, at least in the sense of brushing aside the harshest ones while knowing they exist. Some do it by living in isolation, protecting their creative ground, and only going out into the world when business calls them, or the occassional bouts of socialization that all humans need to some degree come round. The life of the creative person has to be intentional.
It is perhaps the need to be always intentional that ends up leading some people to Decide to Stop being an artist or writer. Because it does require energy just to “keep on”.
I knew one writer who had graduated from the same high school as I, and attended the same undergraduate college. He was talented, very much so. I had admired his work, which seemed more polished and graceful than my own at that time. And yet, when I encountered him at our 10 year high school reunion and asked him how his writing was going, he said he’d given up on it. I was rather surprised to learn this. But I didn’t really know him well enough to pursue the topic and ask him why he’d stopped. I suspect it had to do with the fact that breaking into being published is a lot of work, requiring a lot of persistence in the face of many rejections. Because it wasn’t that he was not any good at it. Memory tells me that I read a shade of bitterness in his face when he said he’d given up. Mind you, by that time, I also still had not had much success on the writing front. But I didn’t regard it as failure, or something I could give up on. I had, by then, just completed my Masters degree, and written a very satisfying thesis on Beowulf. I was satisfied with the bits of scholarship I had, so far, done. What I could not conceive – for myself – was reaching a point where I’d be willing to “give up” on it.
I have a friend who is a fine artist. I put it in the present tense, because I don’t really think that the talent he cultivated has died. But he says he has not done any artwork in well over a decade. I haven’t asked him why, though I am curious about it. I have a sneaking suspicion I know a little bit of what might be behind his Decision to Stop. Way back when, we both did a lot of pen & ink artwork for a journal that I helped edit. Quarter after quarter, there was a need for artwork to grace the pages, full page pieces, and then smaller pieces (headers and column pieces) to illustrate papers on various works of fantasy literature. The constant demand for artwork, and the specificity of some of the requirements, began to become a drain on my own impulses. So I can easily imagine what it was doing to my friend. For ten years, I was producing work “on demand”, whether I was up for it or not. Toward the end of that period, I began to run dry. My love of the activity had been drained off. My enjoyment of manifesting an inner vision got lost. In this case, it had nothing to do with exterior criticisms or frustrations – other than the demand for “more!” The impulse just wasn’t there.
So I stopped. Other than Christmas card designs (I do a new one every year) I haven’t done much artwork in over a decade myself. I’d hit Burn Out. But lately, now that it has been rested, and now that “art of demand” is no longer a part of the situation, it is beginning to come back. I’ve done a few sketches of various sorts for friends, for fun. And the pleasure of it feeds the impulse to do more. I’m not yet back into a regular swing of doing artwork again, but I seem to be heading there.
So, all of this rambling brings me back to the point where I started.
Some people Decide to Stop. And yes, I think it verges on tragedy when talented writers and artists Stop. But because the impulse to create comes from deep inside, I don’t think there’s much anyone outside of the individual can do to change that. The change has to come from the inside. I suppose the best anyone can do in that situation is to simply say “I believe you CAN do this, if you want to.” But whether that statement is what will make the difference … only the individual can tell. I do wish people would not give up, but then, I’m stubborn that way.
Comments
wild_patience – Feb. 25th, 2009
I suspect a lot of those may not have made a conscious decision to stop but just got caught up in higher priority things. I’ve found that doing church music every week leaves me little time to play anything else, even at home for fun. I only have so much time and energy I can spend making music, and that’s devoted to church music. If someone’s working at a computer all day and has a family, they may be too tired to come home and write. (But you knew that. I’m amazed at how much sartorias is able to write.)
scribblerworks – Feb. 26th, 2009
There is that, of course! And I’m certainly familiar with it, since it afflicted me during my years with Jeopardy!. Yet, I still managed to get some writing done.
(And I too am amazed at how much sartorias accomplishes.
