The Underwhelming Lives of Over-imaginative People
picture, if you will, a lone blossom in a desert
Many people—and maybe you’re one—suppose creative individuals lead exciting lives.
They imagine the lives of creative folk are chock full of glamorous and interesting experiences. Considering the legacies of artists, writers, and musicians whose work they’ve admired, they conclude such wealth of creativity could only have arisen from a wellspring of thrilling moments. And sometimes, in so thinking, a seed of envy plants itself in their hearts.
But I’m here to contend the opposite is actually true, and that envy is a waste.
People who are busy living exciting lives full of glamorous and interesting experiences aren’t, for the most part, all that creative (at least that’s my conjecture). Why? Because they don’t have time to be.
Much of the creativity within any of us is fostered in stillness. Much of it is also fostered in pain, but that’s a topic for another day.
Now, I don’t want to be mistaken, so please don’t equate my notion of stillness with idleness.
The stillness I’m talking about is a quality of quiet focus during which the mind (and often the body, as well) is anything but idle. This kind of creative stillness is, however, a spell of time when the frenzy of the mind far outstrips any action the body is undertaking; this is when the process of creativity is underway.
Truth is, during the kinds of experiences many might think of as glamorous or interesting, the mind isn’t free to focus on the act of creating anything. That’s because it’s more likely focused on another act: the act of survival (actual or social).
For instance, if you’re busy zip-lining or skiing, scuba diving or skydiving, it’s not your creative juices that are flowing; it’s your adrenalin.
Oh sure, you might be accruing experiences you can later tap into to conjure creative content of one kind or another; I’m not arguing that. I’m just saying moments of actual thrill aren’t the ones during which creativity unfolds.
Creating anything takes a lot of time.
Most of the time that it takes is spent alone.
Again, we’re not necessarily talking about idle time. For instance, gardening, housework, hiking, or mowing the lawn can hardly be considered idleness, but because all these activities can be undertaken with the less-creative part of the brain on autopilot, the creative center of the brain is freed to be firing on all burners.
Clearly in this example I’m talking only about the foundational phase of creativity, the planning stage when you might be thinking about that next scene you’re going to write, that next watercolor you want to tackle, or that kernel of an idea you have for a song or other creative endeavor.
Shifting into Second Gear
Stage two, the active stage of creating, also requires solitude, but now it’s going to require your physical attention as well.
Perhaps you’re thinking, well, an entire orchestra, theater troop, or a corps de ballet creates en mass, right? They get together to rehearse, after all. Okay, that’s true, but group rehearsals come only after each member of any creative ensemble has spent incalculable hours honing their individual artistry—in solitude.
So sure, there can be a certain social element to creativity. Most of that, though, takes place during what I call stage three. And it’s a different kind of social construct than the normal kinds pursued by highly sociable people (getting together at a local bar for a drink with friends, meeting with a mom’s group or some community committee, attending a concert or sporting event).
That’s because a mind engaged in social activity, just like a mind engaged in work, sport, or thrill, isn’t free to create, and this, then, explains why so many creative people are introverted. They might not be loners, per se, but often they are people who are quite content—driven, even—to spend time in no one else’s company but their own (and perhaps the company of the characters they’ve created in their heads).
Stage three of the creative process is the roll-out, the reveal. It’s the gallery show the artist participates in, a playwright’s script brought to life in its actual hours of staged production, a novelist’s book finally published.
Those are the social moments of creativity, but they’re surprisingly fleeting, quickly supplanted by the next shiny object consumers of the creative arts are drawn to.
So all this has been to say that day-to-day lives of creative people you may know or admire--artists and actors, writers, poets, and sculptors, designers of every kind—are mostly made up of the same kinds of daily grind as anyone else’s. They’re going to day jobs and picking up their kids from school. They’re buying groceries and scrubbing their bathroom sink.
The main thing that’s different is that in between all the rote parts of daily living they spend less time in the company of others.
The seeds of creativity take root in stillness, remember?
Where that Underwhelming S**t Hits the Fan(base)
If you’ll recall, the title of this week’s issue mentioned over-imaginative people. So far, we’ve just talked about creative people in general, which to my way of thinking means imagination of a balanced sort.
But over-imaginative people are a breed apart, which isn’t to say I’m touting an over-active imagination as a desirable trait. Quite the opposite.
That’s because over-imaginative people build up everything in their minds to a greater breadth, width, height, and intensity than will ever play out in reality.
Because of that, disappointments constantly loom since nothing will ever match what the over-imaginative person’s mind can conjure. It leaves me wondering if an over-active imagination might not just be another manifestation of bi-polar disorder, since it has such stark swings of highs (imagining how wonderful a pending event will be) and lows (experiencing the actual event as it occurs).
Nearly everything I’ve ever anticipated wound up being a let-down, whether it’s been a party I was invited to (rare as that is), a trip planned to someplace special, my grad school graduation, or the long-awaited release of my debut novel.
Yeah, that last one, a seed of my own creativity planted several years ago, finally blooms tomorrow, the official book launch day for my debut children’s novel, Shay the Brave.
You’d think I’d be over the moon, right? That I’d be having that zip-lining sensation of wEEEEeeeeeeee!
Yeah. Not so much.
You’d think that after years of this kind of thing one would learn to manage their expectations. It isn’t as if people like me are devoid of logic; it isn’t that we don’t have a good grasp on reality. In fact, maybe it’s the opposite; maybe we know reality all to well: we let our imaginations run away with us knowing full well that reality never will.
And this whole internet thing? It doesn’t help. Naturally everyone wants to put their best foot forward, so the information highway’s full of folks bent on making it look as if they’re flyin’ down that fast lane of life in sunlit convertibles, the wind in their hair and laughter on their faces. Look! My book’s a number-one best seller! Look! My painting’s hanging in The Louvre! Listen! My song just went platinum!
Yeah, yeah. And I gotta go scrub my toilet, then spend another three years trying to write a book someone might publish so only ten people can buy it.
It’s depressing.
It’s depressing because I can imagine it SOOooooo much better.
I can imagine being asked to come do a book signing. I can imagine an indie bookstore eager to stock my novel and not having to have their arm twisted to consider it. I can imagine someone wanting foreign translation or movie rights. I can imagine my book on the NYT best-seller list or getting a five-star Kirkus review.
Yes, active imaginations create art.
But over-active imaginations create disappointment.
So what’s a creative person to do? Sit again in front of that blank page or blank canvas? Yes. Summon the muse to be amusing even while the heart if wilting? Absolutely. Twist the arm of another indie bookstore owner? Probably.
But first, scrub your toilet. Fill out that grocery list. The daily grind is made up of more than coffee and the unattainable dream of a Great American Novel.
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Warmest thanks for journeying with me through my Monday morning thoughts. If it sparked any thoughts of your own, please share them in comments, especially if you’ve ever built something up in your mind then had to face … (queue the theme music from the movie Jaws) … reality.
Also, help me congratulate Susanna Murry, the grand prize winner of my 2023 Thursday drawings to become or create a character in my next children’s novel, the sequel to Shay the Brave! Woot!
Additionally, I’d like to announce a forthcoming interim companion book to Shay the Brave, a journal called Share With Shay filled with thought-provoking prompts. Hopefully a cover-reveal is in the near-distant offing for that, so be sure to keep watching my author page at Wild Ink Publishing for possible updates.
Also be on the lookout for my 2024 weekly drawings to start soon, one aimed directly at educators, librarians, and homeschool parents. Details will be announce in a week or two right here on Monday Morning Literary Bric-a-Brac.
Great read. I concur on the feeling of post-book-release/post-production let-down. There is so much build-up to getting the book out there, getting the play up -- and we don't often have a lot of control over how it will be received or whether it is going to sell. But step one is getting it out there and you've crossed that hurdle. So maybe part of the feeling is realizing that there is even more work ahead: which is to promote your book and yourself. Tough task for people who, as you point out, tend to be introverted. I look forward to getting my copy of Shay and having you sign it.
So your musings this morning engender two strains of thought in response:
1. I like your term”creative stillness”-it’s one I find helpful in helping me discern what focus my mind needs at various points in the creative process.
I do think there’s also quiet stillness-that state where the mind is at rest-as in an intentional meditative state. I believe both types of stillness are important in the creative process.
2. On the disappointment on accomplishing or reaching or experiencing a long dreamed-of goal or event or milestone—I believe many, even most people experience a sense of let-down at some point after they cross the finish line. After the glow and euphoria wears off. Oh now what? What’s next? All that work, waiting, dreaming, planning…maybe a near lifetime of it — and now as you said the toilet needs scrubbing.
I guess the idea of having one of my novels published has always been more of a terrifying possibility than a imaginative dream-because if that happens my life changes and people will have expectations of me and I’ll have to do a boatload of work to promote my book and I can no longer play at being a novelist.
Maybe it’s like the “think global, act local” concept — dream wildly, act intentionally (just do the next right thing).