#Creativity – It Ain’t About the Benjamins

 The Reality Talk

(Language warning about halfway through. Just FYI)

One of the great blessings in my life is my supportive family. My wife supports me doing what makes me happy. My adult child was one of the primary forces in pushing me towards a more serious approach to my writing. They are happy with any milestone I achieve. Came up with a story idea. Yay! Finished a story. Yay! Published something. Yay! SOLD something. Yay! They are always there for me.

Turns out, not everyone is so lucky.

As I spend more time around the larger writing community, I discover an unhappy number of writers whose families not only don’t support them, but actively discourage them from following their love. Family and friends will tell them to give up, to walk away, to stop pretending, on and on and on.

I couldn’t believe it. Several years later, with the evidence that this is not uncommon, I’m still hard pressed to believe that such people exist.

I know, I’m naïve.

The most recent story was one where the husband sits the wife down for the “reality talk”. It wouldn’t matter if the roles were reversed, but it bugs me when husbands do this to their spouse.

“Sweetheart, have a seat. I need to tell you just how little I think of you and what you laughingly call your ‘talent’. Let’s be honest, you’re wasting time on something I think is useless when you could do things of which I approve. So let’s knock it off, get our heads straight and get back to some marital bliss. Okay? Okay.  Good talk.”

I have a whole tirade on the subject of what a jerk move this entire concept is, but blog isn’t about that. It’s about being creative. So let me address you if your family and/or spouse don’t support your creative efforts.

Fuck ’em.

Sorry for the language (I’ll go back and put a warning in at the beginning of the post) but I’m serious. So let me make clear how I feel on the subject.

FUCK. THEM.

Ok, that’s out of my system. Language should revert to normal now.

In the case of the original post, my temptation was to say “Divorce him.” Why would you want someone like that in your life? Here’s my basic assumption-that the OP is not neglecting their part of the relationship. Stuff that needs to get done, gets done. That they are doing their writing in their free time. As long as you are holding up your end, write, paint, take pictures, dance, sing. Whatever. Let your inner Creative express themselves. You’ll be happier and that should make their marriage happier.

So if you feel a desire to be creative, in whatever form that may be, do it. Please, please, please remember that the goal of creativity is NOT making money. If you work at your creativity, you may make money. Heck, you might make buttloads of money. But the act of creativity is not grounded in economics.

It is grounded in the need to be creative. That need is stronger in some than others. That’s fine. If doodling on a notepad satisfies your creative urges, more power to you. Paint a Christmas tree ornament or a mural, dance in your kitchen or on the stage, take photos of your children or of vast landscapes in a hundred hues and tones. Do arts and crafts or sculpt in marble.

Do You.

Do Your Creative Thing.

Do NOT listen to the folks who want to shove into their idea of what “reality” looks like. Do not let them tell you that creativity is justified by dollar signs. Most of us will make little to no money from our creativity. That’s reality. Any money I earn is great (and, honestly, needed at the moment). But it is not now, nor has it ever been the reason I create. I do it because it expresses a powerful force in my soul. I do it because it makes me a more complete person. I do it because it makes me happy.

And if people around you love you, they want you to be happy too.

There. That’s MY reality talk.

Peace.