#56. The Creative and the Inner Child
Hello there ladies and gentlemen and welcome to another episode of Making Lemonade,
The podcast where we talk about how we take the lemons that life gives us and all of the different flavours of lemonade that we as creatives and as people make throughout our lives.
This week we are talking about the child inside all of us how it pertains to staying creative.
Not sure what that means?
Then let’s just get into it aye...
I want you to do a thought exercise with me,
Close your eyes, if pure driving please don’t close your eyes, this is more about closing your mind and visualising.
Now can you hear that?
It’s the sound of children playing a jungle gym, they are having the time of their lives.
You look closer and one of the children going down the slide, looks familiar, in fact so familiar, you begin to get this feeling in your stomach that you know them very well, but you can’t pick it out.
Next thing you now that child comes up to you and puts to their hand or you to come with them.
Go ahead, take it, this is not a trap, I promise.
The child then takes you over to a tree, not too far off in the distance.
This is no ordinary tree, it’s quite large and its branches are strong.
Oh if only this tree could talk, it could tell you thousands of stories because it’s probably seen hundreds of thousands of people in this park alone.
The tree looks wise and the child begins climbing it, but not too high so that you can’t hear them yell down to you; “come up with me!”.
You hesitate, but there’s something so familiar about this child that you can’t help but be curious.
Once you get to the point of the tree where the child is, you can see they have found a seat like structure in the tree and you are both now sitting in the tree together.
Before you can say anything, the child says hello and then says your name, as if they are an old friend of yours that you haven’t seen in years.
This is when you start to realise that this child is you from the past, that’s why they felt so familiar.
This is where they say to you, “I am proud of you, did you become who we wanted to become?”
The answer to this question will vary for all of you, I usually feel like I have to apologise for my mental health and the twists and turns that I know this poor boy will have to go through to get to me.
I then tell him I am an illustrator, of comic books none the less and his eyes light up, he can’t believe it.
He tells me that I have the coolest job in the world and he can’t wait until he gets to draw comic books.
This part makes me cry every time.
He asks me what being a father is like and what our daughter is like.
I tell him everything, he can’t believe how awesome I am and he can see the pain but surprisingly he is not phased by it.
This is just me but I urge you to have a similar conversation with your Inner Child.
Take a moment to pause it and just chat.
How was it? Are you proud of you, is your inner child excited to become you?
“Anyways”, the child says, I’m going to go play, the kids will need me back, I’m the captain of the pirate ship and we need to save our gold!
Part. 2
What was the purpose of that exercise and what has it got to do with creativity?
Everything.
Children have the purest sources of creativity and if you are not in touch with your inner child, you're not living up to your full creative potential.
Okay, think of it like this…
When Goku was fighting Freza on the planet Namek he didn’t know he could become Super Saiyan, until I think its Vegeta…(let me know on Instagram if I’m wrong), tells him he can. This changes everything and helps Goku defeat Frieza in his final form.
My point is, without this information, Goku didn’t know what he was capable of.
I am giving you a skill here, I am telling you as a creative you can go Super Saiyan, with the exercise that I just ran you through at the top of this podcast.
Do you want an almost endless well of creativity?
Then stay connected, stay bonding, stay close to your inner child.
Most people will stifle their childishness in fear of being judged or ridiculed, or even considered immature.
Which is quite ironic because we as a society, highly respect those who have a child-like nature and are not afraid to show their inner child, Jim Carrey, Jack Black, Stan Lee, Kevin Smith, Joe Rogan, Zoe Deschanel, just to name a few.
In fact, in my personal opinion, this ignoring and containment of the inner child can most times cause immaturity and help people to lack growth and evolution because a large number of people just get stuck in high school and although they may grow physically, they defiantly don’t grow psychologically.
Its actually kind of whacky and hard to believe, but the route to emotional maturity is being connected to your childish side.
Creativity is a childish affair because children have the purest and strongest understanding of creativity and imagination.
I personally have found that if I don’t continue to do the things that make me happy on a daily basis, like reading a graphic novel, or watching animated movies with my daughter, I am not happy, in fact it is where my depression begins to fester and grow in that space between me as a 26-year-old man and that 6-8-year-old boy who discovered all these amazing worlds and continued to draw after all these years.
I owe so much to that kid because without him I would not be as good at drawing as I am today.
If he had have given up all those years ago because people said he couldn’t draw well, I wouldn’t be anywhere near as good as I am today.
Drawing is a perfect example of this.
I know that if I am not drawing, I am not being.
I draw, therefore I am.
It's very hard to explain this feeling to non-creatives, or those who do not feel this strong yearning towards something.
For example, when I speak to an athlete who has found their calling and they talk about being out on the court or the field, I hear them talking about the exit same feeling that I feel when I am in my studio drawing.
It's cathartic, it’s natural, it's like the stars have aligned and it becomes exactly where you belong.
It’s that “zone” people are always talking about.
I’m not a godly man but it is “god”, it is the universe showing you that this is you and this feeling is what life is about.
It's incredible!
You can become unstoppable, in this state.
It’s what people chase when you hear people say you are “Chasing The Dragon”.
It’s a high that you can never come down from, never be hurt by, never be broken from.
So I urge you, ladies and gentlemen,
Stay in touch with your inner child, find you're why, find that thing that puts you in the zone like no other and chase it every day, because I believe that’s what we are all here for.
If you re a creative of any form, and you want to go super Saiyan God, you need to first learn to go Super Saiyan, and this is exactly where you begin your training.
So hop in that hyper barrack time chamber, set it to 12 months of training at the strongest level of gravity you can take and fucking train!
Train with your inner child, work through your resentments and your walls, break down the barriers you have lived with through all of these years and go god damned Super Saiyan and evolve damn it, grow up by staying young.
Learn from your mistakes, keep getting up and show the world you will not be beaten, you will not stay down and like Goku, become the best at what you do!