Archive for the ‘I have a horrible inner critic.’ Category

Why Trusting the Process is Bullshit

You have to show up for the creative process. You have to practice your art every day. But you don’t have to trust it. What you have to trust is something much harder than the process.

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Art is Alchemy: Part I (Plus: So What?)

Knowledge of the tenets of ancient and medieval alchemy can actually deepen and enliven your artistic practice.

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Thoughts on Thoughts of Creative Acts, Process, and Time

When you’re being creative — writing or painting or performing or whatever — and you start to think about your creative process, and then you begin to write or talk about your creative process, and then writing or talking about the creative process becomes your creative act in and of itself, because you’re so obsessed [...]

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Creative Joining: How (and Why) to Transcend Criticism

Yesterday I was criticized from a quarter I wasn’t expecting. It stung so deeply that I could feel it in my body — literally, a physical reaction — for the rest of the day and well into today. The criticism itself was rather minor, but my reaction to it was so major that I realized [...]

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Posted on August 29, 2010 at 9:58 pm by starkravingmuse · Permalink · Leave a comment
In: I have a horrible inner critic., I have no support for my art. · Tagged with: 

Is criticism failure?

Last night I dreamt I was being supported by two strong women: one on the ground before me holding my feet, the other right behind me holding my back. Today I felt knocked over a bit by the world — I was criticized by someone I didn’t expect it from — and I kept coming [...]

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You don’t own your creativity.

I’m back to the visual arts as my primary artistic outlet. It’s because I remembered why I stopped writing creatively when I started my job as a grant writer so many years ago: I needed to get out of my head come five o’clock. And although I returned to my writing for several of the [...]

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The Artist Is Not Something You Become

I’m working these days on two separate essays, one on summer in the suburbs and the other on making a cake — the most special cake I’ve ever made in my life. At least that’s what they’re about on the surface. My intent (and my style) is to go much deeper with them. I excerpted [...]

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Stark Raving Monday v4: Questioning Self-Doubt

It’s something I always do: I get all gung-ho about a project, dive right in — and then choke. I question my motives, my commitment, and most of all my qualifications and credibility, my ability to compete with the big boys and girls. I’m almost 41, and many days I still feel like I’m 12. [...]

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Changing Chores into Creative Acts, or: What’s the Opposite of Creativity?

I finished the ceiling draping in the family room. Each drape is now a hammock for a portion of the kids’ stuffed animal menagerie, solving not just the problem of the ugly exposed ceiling beams but also the problem about where the animals would live. So there’s that. I am counting this as my creative [...]

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High-Risk Reframes: How Positive Thinking Can Backfire

The reframe can be one of the most useful, and one of the most dangerous, tools in the psychotherapist’s or coach’s box. It’s when you state a reality back to the client that casts what he or she has been saying in a whole new light. For (a really simplistic) example, if you’re complaining about [...]

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