week one: soulful intentions
life as a creative process
Sending love and prayers to everyone affected by the California wildfires. ♥
If you’re new here, paid subscribers receive Story Work exercises every Sunday night at 8 pm et. Story Work is the name of my new book which is forthcoming from Broadleaf in November 2025. The term describes my signature process of reflecting, reclaiming, and reimagining the stories of our lives. It involves looking at your life experiences as creative material that you have the power to shape. For the next eight weeks, our story work series will be focused on life as a creative process. Tonight, we start with setting soulful intentions.
An audio introduction to life as a creative process:
I remember sitting in school daydreaming about being rich, accomplished, and successful. Thinking about what that would look like in terms of jobs, titles, possessions, and status, but not so much thinking about what my soul longed for.
I remember losing my sense of self in motherhood, in my relationships, in my personal and professional roles. I remember that checking the boxes I was told to check didn’t feel as good as I thought it would. I realized I needed more, but at the same time, I didn’t believe I was worthy or capable of more.
I remember losing hope when my daydreams turned into nightmarish flashbacks and forecasts that magnified my shortcomings, failed attempts, and bad decisions.
I remember believing I was not strong enough to change, so I should just play the cards I’d been dealt. Wear the smile. Hide the tears. Be satisfied with the bare minimum. Let go of what's beyond your reach.
From this place of submission, I remember thinking it would be nice to have a creative outlet, a little pocket of joy and meaning that was all my own.
I found escape in writing and talking about writing. Reading and talking about books. Communing with art and artists. Studying creativity and the creative process. I discovered my own kind of joy.
The more I paid attention to what made me feel good, the more I found the clarity and capacity to change the game I was playing.
Just a sliver of creative thinking was all it took to get some momentum going. Over time that little pocket of joy grew into a different way of life. And it all started with giving myself permission to seek out joy on my own terms.
a few things I know for sure
Life is a creative process, and we are all creative beings.
Trying to navigate the world we live in without a creative practice is like walking in the dark when you have the power within you to turn on the light.
When you have a creative urge, acting on it releases tension and improves your overall well-being. Denying yourself the freedom to be curious and indulge your creativity is not only harmful to your growth and happiness, but it also prevents your unique light from illuminating the way for others.
A creative urge doesn’t have to be something you can measure or monetize. A creative calling doesn’t have to be a specific project, goal, or result. Broadly speaking, a creative calling is an intuitive pull toward an idea, mindset, vision, or way of life.
A creative calling requires you to develop a mindset that challenges what is considered normal in the dominant culture and to honor the individuality of your own needs, preferences, and choices.
Our creative callings always come with a challenging contradiction:
When we dare to make the creative decisions we are called to make, this is when our fears and inner conflicts flare up the most and distract us from what we set out to do.
We feel the tug-of-war between our desires and doubts, what we love and what we fear, and that’s when we need support and resources to get us through.