Screaming At The Silent Wall - Does Anyone Really Care What I Create?

It can be incredibly frustrating and isolating when you’re creating on your own for days, weeks, months on end, without seeing any real impact that your creative efforts are having.

Have you felt sometimes that no-one in the world even KNOWS you create, let alone cares?

These kind of feelings can be very demotivating, as expressing ourselves and connecting with others are major reasons why we create.

Take heart though, your creating is not in vain. Here’s a story to give you some hope:

Each morning, Ellen followed a similar routine. She’d haul herself out of bed at 7am, shower, dress and grab her writing journal on the way out.

Three streets away was Cindy’s, Ellen’s favourite coffee shop. Each morning, she’d arrive at Cindy’s to be greeted by a steaming cup of coffee and a cheerful greeting like: “Morning! How’s our future J. K. Rowling today? What’ll you have today?”

Ellen would coyly smile, answer “It’s going ok. Thank you. I’ll have scrambled eggs and two toast, thanks”, before settling down in her favourite seat near the window.

Taking out her journal, Ellen flicked through the most recent few pages, to reacquaint herself with where she’d got to the day before. Then she’d pause for a moment’s thought, before setting off once more on the writing of her latest book.

Every day, for the last 12 months or more, as predictable as the sunrise, a young man walked past Ellen on his way to work. She’d often catch his gaze for a split second, before he hurried along on his way and she returned to her writing.

This morning, the man didn’t walk by with the same haste. As he approached, Ellen noticed him heading for the door of Cindy’s. He was coming inside!

Ellen dropped her gaze and busied herself in her writing, trying to pretend she hadn’t noticed the man entering, and at the same time keeping half an eye on his movements. He was heading over to Ellen’s table!

“Excuse me? Hi.” The man offered. “I’m sorry to disturb you, I know you’re busy writing.”

“Oh, er, that’s ok. Hi.” Ellen managed to reply.

The man held out a small colourful printed flyer. Ellen could see it was for a painting exhibition at a gallery in the next town, she recognised their name.

“I’d like to invite you to something.”The man said, obviously shy. “It’s my first exhibition of my paintings.”

“Oh, wow! Thank you.” Ellen didn’t really know what to say.

“I owe you so much” continued the man.

“Each day I’ve walked past here for more than a year, each day you’re writing. ‘That’s a true artist’, I’d say to myself, ‘dedicated to her art’. One day I decided I couldn’t ignore my desire to paint anymore. I figured if you were brave enough to sit here in a public place and freely create, the least I could do set up some canvases at home and see what happened. Once I started painting again I realised how much I’d missed it. Anyway, here I am a couple months later with my first exhibition! I’d be so honoured if you’d come...”

Ellen went along to the exhibition. She was amazed by his work, a collection of paintings of the city streets around where they both lived. The centrepiece in the whole exhibition? A beautiful painting of Ellen sitting in the coffee shop, entitled simply, “Saviour Girl”.

We often don’t know just what an influence we have on other people’s creativity.

Just by showing up to create each day, you can not only increase your creativity, but have a positive influence on others who just need that extra little push or spark of inspiration to create what matters most to them in their lives.

There are many ways you can be more creative. I invite you to take a positive step to increase your creativity today by downloading your free copy of the powerful and practical "Explode Your Creativity!" Action Workbook at http://www.CoachCreative.com

From Creativity Coach Dan Goodwin