The Artist’s Way – Week 2 – Recovering a Sense of Identity

This week focuses on recovering a sense of personal identity. The journey of recovering your creative self comes with many external obstacles, inner conflicts, and uncertainty. A strong sense of identity grounds us and gives us the strength to weather the storms of obstacles, conflicts, and uncertainty. Losing your personal identity may likely lead to the search of self-worth from others. In this chapter, Cameron provides concepts and tools with the aim to establish a strong sense of personal identity. 

Before We Start: Week 1 Checklist

Recovering a Sense of Safety can be tough when confronting deep rooted fears and embracing the neglected inner child. Not to mention incorporating daily affirmations and forming this as a new habit (tap into The Power of Habit to learn how you can master your habits). Let’s do a little pulse check:

• How many days did you do your Morning Pages? How did that feel?
• Did you take yourself out on an Artist Date? What did you do and how did that feel? 
• Describe the other things that are relevant to your recovery (if any).
  
  

Going Sane

Going sane feels just like you’re going insane. Trusting one’s own creativity can feel like learning a whole new behavior. Going out of your comfort zone to learn something new takes effort and can lead to resistance. Just like doing your Morning Pages. The following thoughts may emerge: “I’ll do it tomorrow”, “Three pages is a LOT”, “What if someone gets his or her hands on this?!”, “I don’t think this is going to work”, et cetera.

Note that it is very common to feel this resistance to change. It is a symptom of recovery. Rediscovering your creative self is a fluctuating process of change. Nobody really likes change since it is a fertile ground for self-doubt, which then can lure you into self-destructive thoughts. Don’t let your self-doubt turn in to self-destruction. Instead, turn to the affirmations we’ve learned in ‘Week 1 – Recovering a Sense of Safety’. 

Identify Poisonous Comrades

“I don’t know, I just don’t think that’s a good idea”, “I don’t understand why you’re doing this. I don’t know you anymore”, “This is not who you are”. Be wary of those who criticize you. Not everyone is right about his or her opinion of you. ‘Poisonous Comrades’ see you recovering while they might still feel more comfortable in their own misery and self-pity.

Use the Morning Pages ritual as a channel to your inner guide, which is a very important component for recovering your sense of identity. You know how you feel more than anyone else, you know what’s best for you, and you are the one who looks out for you. Further along your recovery, you’ll learn to believe in yourself more, to be happy, and you’ll discover the joy of putting your creativity into practice. 

Identify Crazy-Makers

‘Crazy-Makers’ are those who create havoc. They are the drama queens who expect you to be there no matter what. They are the persuasive puppet masters who set fire to relationships by feeding people with malicious rumors and watch them turn against each other. They are the venomous charismatic ones who always have a problem with you or point fingers at others. Pull yourself away from these Crazy-Makers before you become another victim of their negative cycle of cognitive distortions. 

Sidestep Skepticism

Skepticism is another hurdle of the recovery process. We need to cautiously move the inner skeptic aside so we can experiment during the process of recovering our creativity. The point here is to continuously experiment with an open mind and steadfastly move through a barrage of noise. 

Focus on Your Attention

Creative barriers often manifest in the addiction to fantasies of what you should’ve, would’ve, and could’ve done. Fear manifests itself from past experiences and spreads like a virus into present and future decisions. Focus on the things that are real and be more aware of the present. Prioritize the things that support a healthy recovery of your creative self. 

Rules of the Road

Cameron provides 10 rules that will guide you during the spiritual path of higher creativity.

Week 2 Exercises to Recover a Sense of Identity

Next: [ Week 3 ] – Recovering a Sense of Power

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Cameron, J. (2017). The Artist’s Way: A Spiritual Path to Higher Creativity(12th Edition ed.). New York: J.P. Tarcher/Putnam.