Hahaha! WIPE OUT!

It’s that time of the month to talk about creativity. But I’ve got to be honest, I’m burnt. So I’m going to embrace a very scary topic that creatives don’t like to think about. Yup, you’ve got it. I’m focusing on BURNOUT.

It happens to all of us at some point. It freaks us the heck out when it does. We all immediately wonder if this is finally it, the end of the road. The fears bombard us: what if I never create again? what if this was all I could ever do? BUT all of that relies on the fallacy that creativity is something we can drink dry. It’s right up there with “retiring” from creating (I always laugh when I hear a seasoned and successful creator say that they’re old and tired and done; followed inevitably by something brand new down the road).

Creativity isn’t end-able. The problem is that society has tricked us into thinking that we must produce, produce, produce and do it on a timeline that fits business needs. Creativity doesn’t work like that.

I’ve been reading bits and pieces of Amie McNee’s book WE NEED YOUR ART and it’s been an interesting ride. At first I had a hard time getting into it (a lot of the intro felt similar to Julia Cameron’s The Artist’s Way which I’ve mentioned several times already). I also don’t know that I agree with everything she says (as she approaches things from a very revolutionary take). I also admit that I haven’t read the book in full. I had a library copy that is now overdue and I skipped ahead (because I’m a horrifically slow reader) to the burnout chapter because that’s where I’m at and what I needed.

Dear reader, this book spoke to me. I felt both called out AND seen. I love when a book challenges me like this. It is Amie McNee who talks about the societal impact on creators that has given me a moment of pause. Some of it is so endemic that I admit I hadn’t seen it myself! And she calls it out like it is with a gong of truth that rings and resonates LOUDLY. (That is me saying, this is a book WELL worth reading!) I’m going to return my library copy and buy a copy of my own that I can spend some serious time with. That’s a GOOD sign this is a paradigm shifter of a book (and it IS!).

Let’s look at how she defines burnout:

“Burnout is a state of emotional, physical, and mental exhaustion, caused by excessive and prolonged stress.”

Well … yeah. I instantly recognized myself. My emotions were the first thing hit by the school closure. That then took a mental toll on me as I dealt with everyone else’s grief and anger over the last few months. Then we packed like mad (as everything that wasn’t nailed down had to go). I knew I needed physical recovery from that, but what about the rest? I thought I’d need my typical “one week of sleep” as soon as school got out to catch up and feel “rested” (is that actually a thing?), but that came and went and … I’m still burnt. I don’t even want to look at a sketchbook right now.

My summer is my key time for creativity! But what if … what if I’m so burnt, I can’t create this summer? There’s the fear creeping in and it brought a LOT of baggage with it.

Then I had a foot procedure done and I was forced to sit. Did I rest? Not really. Yes I was sitting, but I was working on catching up with emails and computer work. I was still working, because there are still things to do that don’t feel as creative. Then I read this chapter and I felt called out. This section right here nailed me to the wall:

Sometimes I do treat my creativity like a 9 to 5 job! I wasn’t actually letting myself rest. Why? Because I have a really hard time resting! I don’t like sitting still and doing NOTHING. It’s just not in my DNA. But that’s not healthy either. We need to recognize when we’re burnt and we need to stop seeing rest as a punitive situation. Or something that is “less than.” We all know we need sleep, right? The amount varies by person, but I don’t know any human on earth that can live without it altogether. So why is “rest” seen so negatively in our culture? Don’t believe me? It’s reserved for retirement (after you’ve worked). It can also be seen as “laziness.”

I read that and felt called out. I stopped all the things I was doing and I shut my computer off. I need to value REST. I cannot proceed until I do so. And if you are suffering from burnout too, maybe you need to rest too.

An illustrator friend and I have been talking about this at great length lately. I gave her this advice about recognizing that her well was dry, that she needed to rest, and then she’d see her creative spark come back. It’s what I’ve talked about here before too. Rest and play, right? So why is it easier to help others than apply it to myself? Isn’t that always the way?

There’s a lot more to this chapter that I’m not really digging into. (I promise I’m not summarizing the whole chapter!) She has a great “bare maximum” strategy that I’m not even touching. If you want to read more, read the book. It’s worth the time! I’ll just end with this bit she says right here.

I don’t know about you, but I definitely needed to hear that. So I’m going to be over here resting a bit and just being. I’m not going to push summer goals (i.e., kick them down the road as someone said in a comment to one of these posts before). There’s a part of me that gets angry about the whole thing (like, isn’t this letting “them” win? They killed my creativity with their shenanigans!). Sigh. Rest means working through ALL my emotions from all of this (time for morning pages again to let my brain dump it out, even if it’s just in bits and spurts at first).

Creativity isn’t a timeline. It isn’t an end stop either. We don’t get to a point when it’s just done. It’s like the ocean. It’s always there, but it ebbs and flows. Sometimes the tide is higher than at others. Sometimes its at low tide. But it never goes away. It will be there after I’ve rested and recovered myself. There’s time.

And you too, dear reader. If you are struggling with burnout, take the time to rest. Really and truly rest.

Creativity will wait for you. It always does.