The Artist’s Way – Week 10 – Recovering a Sense of Self-Protection

Explore the perils that can ambush you on your creative path ‘The Dangers of the Trail’ and weed out toxic patterns blocking your creative flow: workaholism, drugs, drought, fame, competition. Enter week 10 of The Artist’s Way: Recovering a Sense of Self-Protection. 

Before We Start: Week 9 Checklist

Self-compassion is a vital part of a healthy lifestyle. How did Week 9 go for you? Were you able to face your fears and internal conflicts? Did you resist the ‘Creative U-turns’? What about the emotional difficulties that beset you in the past? Let’s go through the checklist: 

• 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? 
• Did you do the task list? How did that feel? What was the hardest or most interesting part of the tasks?
• Describe the other things that are relevant to your recovery (if any).
  
  

Dangers of the Trail

Creativity is the Universe’s energy flowing through us and shaped by us like a light shining through a crystal. But you can get emotional vertigo when a huge array of possibilities open up as you begin to sense your real potential. Fear is what leads one to look for anesthesia that creates toxic patterns, blocking your creative flow. 

Being happy is terrifying and being unhappy is familiar. We all have a favorite, most toxic block. Drugs, alcohol, sex, food.. anything to numb the discomfort. If you think about giving up one particular toxic pattern, which one makes you feel reluctant to give up? That toxic pattern is the one that’s derailed you the furthest. 

Preventing dangers of the trail is about becoming aware of blocks or spotting Creative U-Turns.  As a result, the blocks won’t be as effective and it’ll open up a possibility to try out a new idea. And by experimenting with new ideas, you’ll start to sense your true potential. After all, you’ll never know until you really try it. If it doesn’t work out, you can at least cross that off on your list. This is how we grow and reach our true potential. 

Soul-Destroying Addiction: Workaholism

There’s another stealthy toxic block hidden right under our nose: workaholism. It’s a term coined by Wayne Oates, an American psychologist. Workaholism is “a condition in which someone’s need for work becomes so excessive as to create disturbances of interference with personal health and happiness, interpersonal relations and social function“. Like Barbara Killinger beautifully wrote in her article: “It is a soul-destroying addiction”.

Workaholism can gravely affect your life and cause an intense imbalance in your body, mind, and soul. Some of the symptoms that workaholics experience may include: frequent headaches, chronic fatigue, depression, heart palpitations, insomnia, memory loss, trouble concentrating, increased blood pressure, poor digestion, and more. 

Workaholic Quiz
Take a look at the questionnaire by Cameron and check to see how many you’ve chosen ‘often’ as your answer. 

• I work outside of office hours
  never / seldom / often
• I cancel dates with loved ones to do more work
  never / seldom / often
• I postpone outings until deadlines are past
  never / seldom / often
• I take work with me on weekends
  never / seldom / often
• I take it with me on my days off
  never / seldom / often
• I don’t really take vacations
  never / seldom / often
• My intimates complain that I work too much
  never / seldom / often
• I try to do two or more things at once
  never / seldom / often
• I don’t allow myself free time between projects
  never / seldom / often
• I procrastinate in finishing up loose ends
  never / seldom / often
• I set out to do one job and start on three more at the same time
  never / seldom / often
• I work during family time
  never / seldom / often
• I allow calls to interrupt and lengthen my workday
  never / seldom / often
• I don’t prioritize my day to include an hour of creative work and play
  never / seldom / often
• I place my work before my creative dreams
  never / seldom / often
• I fall in with other’s plans and fill my free time with their agendas
  never / seldom / often
• I don’t allow myself downtime to do nothing
  never / seldom / often
• I use the word ‘deadline’ to rationalize my workload
  never / seldom / often
• I go to social engagements with a work notebook or laptop
  never / seldom / often

Creative recovery requires the acknowledgement of workaholism as an addiction. Work is synonymous with worth. The difference between healthy work and obsessive work is emotional content: zestful work toward a cherished goal is one thing and resentful, overbooked work is another. Once workaholism is defined as an abusive behavior, boundaries must be set to abstain from overworking. Workaholism is a toxic block, not a building block. 

Building Resilience to Drought

Drought is referred to dry seasons in creative life when one simply doesn’t feel the creative flow. It is times like these that doubts slide up like sidewinders and one starts to suffer from loss of faith in oneself and the Universe. Though droughts seem like endless and fruitless seasons, these are still a necessity as it brings clarity and charity when you trust that it has a purpose. Like my mom always says: “There is always something to do, even when you’re bored”.

Morning Pages are both one’s wilderness and trail. You may have the feeling that Morning Pages have become pointless and that it must be done because we must. But just like all other healthy habits that must be incorporated in order to build and maintain a healthy lifestyle: when you trust in its purpose and continue to do it, a path will eventually emerge whereby insights from these Morning Pages will lead one out of the wilderness. 

Venomous Need for Fame

Fame is addictive and it leaves us hungry. It produces the “How Am I Doing?” syndrome: it seeks the answer to “How does the work look to them?” instead of “Is the work going well?” The point of work is work and fame interferes with that perception: it creates a continuous feeling of lack, as if what you’re doing is never enough. Especially when we’re all consistently exposed and confronted by viral social media sensations. Fame gives you this incredible feeling of adoration, but at what cost? And is it healthy to be competing with others in the race to stardom? 

The need for fame snaps at one’s heels, discrediting one’s accomplishments and eroding the joy in another’s accomplishments. The crazy thing is that this chase for fame is never going to make you feel like it’s going to be enough since there is constant competition. The only cure for this addictive behavior is a creative endeavor and a joyful heart: actively, consistently, and consciously nurture your creative inner child. After all, in other to be able to love others, one must love thyself first. 

Wandering Off into the Depths of Competition

Competitionis another addiction that may become a creative block. We ask the wrong questions and those questions give us the wrong answers once we compare ourselves to others: “Why me? Why am I always in the wrong place at the wrong time? Why does (s)he get all the breaks?” instead of “Am I feeling what I’m feeling or is my mind elsewhere? Am I following the directions my creativity is leading me?”. 

It’s easy to get lost and wallow in unhealthy addictions instead of staying on the right path and asking the right questions. A competitive focus encourages snap judgments whereby the ego looks for instant wins. At the same time, promising new directions are being cut off as they haven’t been fully formed yet and there is simply no room for baby steps and uncompleted thoughts. The desire for immediate gains is the desire to win approval for others, which serves as an antidote for self-approval.

However, originality is the process of remaining true to oneself. Don’t wander off into competition and the concerns that come with it. The desire tobebetter thanmakes it really hard just to be. It has its place for judges and critics looking for short-term wins, but not for creative artists who opt for the quiet glow of a healthy, lifelong process. 

You Attract Who You Are and What You Believe In

In this chapter, self-protection is about taking care of your inner child as well as your relationship with others. It’s about acknowledging toxic patterns and embracing anger and fear. It’s about knowing where your emotional boundaries are and setting a clear line between you and others. 

Recovering a sense of self-protection is about defining personal boundaries that are critical to a healthy lifestyle and relationships. These include physical boundaries (personal space, privacy, and movement) as well as emotional boundaries (feelings). A healthy balance of self-protection shows signs of confidence, strength, and self-love. Once you start with yourself, you’ll soon realize that you’ll be surrounded with the same kind of energy. After all, you attract who you are and what you believe in.

Week 10 Exercises to Recover a Sense of Self-Protection

Arch-enemies

• Take 7 strips of paper, each strip written on it – alcohol, drugs, sex, work, money, food, family/friends – and put them in an envelope. 
• Draw one out and write down 5 ways that have had a negative impact on your life. If it doesn’t apply, ignore that belief and call it resistance, and think a little sideways until you have an answer. Fold the paper. 
• Now, draw again and do this 7 times. If you find that you draw one more than once, do it again, and know that it’s actually significant. Often, it’s the last impact on the final list of that “oh, not THAT again” that forms the breakthrough. 
  
  

Touchstones
Make a list of things you love and put the list at a place where it can console you. 
Draw or acquire one of the items on the list and, if that makes you feel good, give yourself the time to enjoy that moment.

The Awful Truth
Answer the following questions truthfully:

• What habit do you have that gets in the way of your creativity?
• What do you think might be the problem? (It usually is the problem) 
• What do you plan to do about the problem?
• What’s your pay-off for holding onto the block? (If you can’t figure out the problem, ask a trusted friend)
• Which friends make you doubt yourself? (It’s your self-doubt; they just trigger it)
• Which believe in you and your talent? (The talent is yours, but they believe in it and help you too)
• What’s the pay-off for hanging with the destructive friends? (If the answer is ‘I like them’, ask yourself why)
• Which destructive habits do you destructive friends share with your destructive self?
• Which constructive habits do your constructive friends share with your constructive self? 
  
  

Setting the Bottom Line
Working with your answers to Q3, try setting a bottom line for yourself. 
Begin with 5 of your most painful behaviors (you can always add more later). 

• If you notice that you’re working on extra assignments late into the night, consider something like a rule
  (i.e. bottom line: no homework after 7)
• If you’re waking up too late to do the morning pages, set your clock 20min. earlier, and set a rule that you DO get up and do the morning pages. 
• Bottom line: I will not work on my days off.
• Bottom line: I will no longer take my work with me to social engagements.
• Bottom line: I will not place my work before creative commitments.
• Bottom line: I will plan and partake in an artist’s date each week. 
  
  

Cherishing

• List 5 small victories
• List 3 nurturing actions you took for your creative inner child
• List 3 actions you can take to nurture your creative inner child
• Make 3 promises to yourself and keep them
• Do one lovely thing for yourself each day in this week
  
  

Next: [ Lesson 11 ] – Recovering a Sense of Autonomy

Thanks for reading!
This article captures what I consider to be the highlights of the book and articles that helped me gain understanding of the subject matter, and should only be treated as such. If you enjoyed this article, hit the follow button for more articles and summaries.

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

Flurry, A. (2014, October 31). Study examines psychology of workaholism. From Medical Xpress: https://medicalxpress.com/news/2014-10-psychology-workaholism.html

Killinger, B. (2011, December 15). Understanding the Dynamics of Workaholism. From Pyschology Today: https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/the-workaholics/201112/understanding-the-dynamics-workaholism