Creative people look at life differently than most people. By creative I don’t mean all creators, I am referring to artists, specifically performing artists, like dancers, actors, singers, musicians. There is usually a sensitivity there and life gets processed differently. If you are a performer, you live your life for what you give and express to an audience. You have chosen a hard road because while you may enjoy the act of dancing or singing or whatever, you are all about portraying people, portraying life with all its ups and downs. Your tools are your emotions and your ability to deeply understand life experiences and re-experience them as you perform.
Performing is not the selfish play that some may think it is. It is instead the willingness to experience the emotional impact of everything, to run it through your being and express it, to bare your soul in front of the watching world. And then it is your job to find a way to maintain your center and ground yourself enough to always return to it no matter what role or character or life scenario you are portraying.
Artists being who they are, have a tendency to feel things deeply, take both joy and darkness into their hearts and live it, breathe it, and sometimes feel traumatized by parts of it. If you are not well grounded in your own identity and able to separate yourself from the emotions and stories that live through you and if you are not also able to find closure in your own personal stories, these two issues will break you down. It would be a mistake to think that artists are mentally ill because they live so much in their feelings and often get dragged down by the sadness and pain in this world. Their emotional make up is part of who they are and it may come from painful past experiences in life.
If anything, the use of the self and one’s emotions through the arts is one of the healthiest mental activities one can engage in whether you are a professional in your artistic field or enjoying your creative art activity as a hobby or a therapy like dance or music therapy for example. The sensitivity of an artist, in itself, has nothing to do with mental illness. However, the inability to ground and center yourself and leave yourself open to all the evil and trauma out there in the world as you navigate your work, your projects and your life can wear you down or exacerbate an illness that is already there. If it does, please seek help somewhere. Don’t let it break you.
When you wear your heart on your sleeve or when the issues we face in this world become too heavy to bear alone, these are the times you need to find a ray of light in all the darkness. It is not positivity by means of denial. It is the knowing that no matter how dark the night, or tumultuous the storm, there will be an end to the storm and when that end comes, and you are still standing, you will have the power to transform yourself and others who are watching and learning. You visualize a positive and far better future. You must know that even the worst things happen for a reason, if only to set us on a path to make a difference. No one does that alone! However, you and only you can make the decision to weather the storms of emotions and the tragedies of life and choose to keep going.
Use your creative self wisely. Learn to ground yourself, meditate, visualize the successful outcome of what you are trying to transform, and build a community of positive strong people around you to help you move through it all. Stop thinking and acting like the world is on your shoulders and yours alone. Superman/woman is a fairy tale. Life and getting through this thing alive, inspiring others, being fully who you are and accepting your life and responsibilities is all part of being and cultivating greatness. The pain and heartache and evil this world can bring to us all at different times is real. There is much work to be done. But it is not a burden for one person alone. It’s too much. We are not built for that. We must each transform our own personal issues but we must work together to change the world.
Planet Earth has always been a rough place to reside but fortunately also filled with much beauty and hope and potential for goodness. It really does take a village.
Surround yourself with people who understand you, who reject evil, who believe in a beautiful future, and who are able to find the little bright rays of light in every dark night no matter what. That is how we create healthy solid change. That is how we keep going, keep creating, keep loving life even in the middle of the storms…. even when we can’t see the light some days. It is there, just beyond your horizon. Don’t give up. Don’t quit on life.