In Case No One Told You, It’s Okay to Be Weird.
Far too often we crush creativity and label it weird. But what if your quirks create great art and further your dreams?
“We’re worried about your boys….”
My elementary school principal leans forward in his squeaky leather chair to impart the severity of the conversation.
“It seems they co-authored a book together and read it for a class project. Not only is it one of the most violent things we’ve read, but is quite disturbing as well.”
It’s a well-known fact that when your parents are the ones in the principal’s office, you’re screwed. It’s like a criminal being sent to the electric chair before having the chance to plead their case in front of a jury.
“I’m sure they’re just being boys.”
My best friend’s father sits with his arm draped over his wife’s shoulder, while a wry smile tugs at the corner of his lips. As a military officer, he felt it necessary that his sons (and their friends) understand gun safety. One particular evening I spent the night at their house, we killed a spider with a low-powered rifle. That evening was like going to Disneyland. Only with guns. And spiders.
Raising a skeptical eyebrow, my principal opens his desk drawer and thumbs a couple pages of our literary masterpiece entitled: RamFlake. Then, like one of those scenes out of a Jason Bourne flick, tucks the booklet back into a manilla folder and flings it at my parents.
“Have a look for yourself.” He says.
An hour later, there’s yelling that peaks at a crescendo when my best friend’s mom lays into her husband. “You see what happens when you let them shoot guns in the house!? This is your fault!”
My parents, however, don’t blame them. A few weeks prior they let me watch Rambo, and now need to ensure I’m not a sociopath.
Sociopath? Or creative?
RamFlake was my magnum opus (for an elementary school kid). The book chronicled the story of a mutant snowflake who trained in ancient martial arts and advanced weaponry tactics. Where he learned all of this was kept secret (AKA I was 10, so I didn’t care to write it in). Much like the Rambo movies, he wore a bright red bandana across his snowy forehead. RamFlake didn’t wear the bandana as a memento because of a tragic loss like in the movie. Oh no. He wore that red rag because it was badass.
Did I mention he never wore a shirt and was jacked like the Hulk?
Throughout my novella he would fight through “levels” of evil monsters while decapitating them with his oversized hunting knife. My favorite execution was when he punched a monster in the face while smashing a grenade into the hole it left, only to walk away while not looking back as his enemy’s head exploded (I might have issues).
The villains in our story were local bullies. Since I was small and couldn’t beat them up, I had RamFlake do it fictitiously. At the time, I’d been watching a lot of Who Framed Roger Rabbit, and for the final boss scene, I ensured eyeball popping action to reveal my opponent’s demented red, beady eyes. I had RamFlake kill them with a Bowie knife he kicked like a soccer ball across the room, to once again, decapitate his foe.
The story wasn’t original by any means. It was a mash-up of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles on ice, Rambo, Batman, Mega Man, and a helluva lot of gratuitous violence from a 10-year-old’s imagination. So what happens when you end up writing a piece like that? Your parents get sent to the principal’s office and you get detention.
You might believe I’ve grown up a little since then, but that 10-year-old still runs around rampant in my heart, writing insane stories. It makes me a little weird and off to others. My parents, wife, friends, and even my boss can attest to this (I almost didn’t get a job, because my boss found me too weird at first).
I can tell you stories about the times my parents would find me on the roof. I told them I could fly and was from Krypton. They screamed I was human and susceptible to gravity. Or they can point to the numerous times I would microwave spiders and try to get them to bite me. I was convinced I could replicate Spider-Man’s transformation, but my family just ended up with a lot of exploded spider guts in the microwave. After one such attempt I thought worked, I removed my clothes and climbed the side of our house naked (my clothes were inhibiting my Spidey abilities). The neighbor called my parents to ask why there was a naked kid climbing the side of their house.
Even now my brain comes up with fun stories I want to turn into books, lessons I’ve learned, or has me say outlandish things. For instance, early in my marriage I told my spouse we should install a giant plastic ball pit (like what’s at Chuck-Cheese) in the middle of our house. Upon hearing my idea, my wife sighed and said, “…..I can’t handle how damn strange you are sometimes.”
More often than not, however, weird isn’t considered cute or creative. It’s viewed quite the opposite and left to be stomped out like a small fire before it can spread.
Why Do We Crush Creativity?
I meet a lot of college students who are bound and determined to get a corporate job as soon as they’ve graduated. Yet, I meet plenty of men and women in suits who lament the fun they had in college, believing fun comes in small doses these days. “Fun” looks like spreadsheets and meetings, and life is serious business. Creativity doesn’t pay the bills, anyway. Music, painting, perusing comic book stores, dreaming, writing stories, taking vacations, and adventures are for men and women who have the time or just downright lazy.
On the other end of the spectrum there are those who feel their weirdness crippling or that it will never amount to anything more than a lame hobby. Rejection letters, creative break-ups, or failure has them believing their story, art, or music is too strange to captivate someone else. However, the oddest ducks win big when they persevere. Author Stephen King received so many rejection notes that the nail in his wall would no longer support the weight of the slips impaled upon it. He replaced the nail with a spike and went on writing in a genre many found repulsive at the time: horror. When founder of HeartSupport, Jake Luhrs, decided to scream instead of sing in a band, people told him that style of music would never make it big and was the influence of the Dark Lord, Satan, himself. He’s now a Grammy-Nominated recording artist who tours internationally.
Society more often than not tells us the weird are outcasts when the reality is the weirdos are the ones who end up creating beautiful art we enjoy. Because we don’t want to appear bizarre in front of others though, most of us stifle those creative/odd/off-the-wall tendencies for a cleaner, corporate version of ourselves people tolerate. But tolerance is the tyranny of the masses among creatives. The message communicated to us is: don’t be the weird guy and we’ll conditionally accept your presence, and then maybe your art.
I wonder how much more exciting this world would be if more of us faced down crippling rejection and instead found the freedom that comes when we let our minds wander and let the creative weirdo out. Maybe we’d have fun instead of squabbling over nothing on social media. Maybe we’d embrace people for who they are, not what we expect them to be.
So just in case no one ever told you, I’ll tell you now: It’s okay to be a little weird. You might even find your calling in your peculiarity. A forewarning: there will be naysayers along the way. You’ll receive rejection letters, cold shoulders, and other people just won’t understand.
When that day comes along, remember this bit of advice from someone who’s experienced it too:
“If you write (or paint or dance or sculpt or sing, I suppose), someone will try to make you feel lousy about it, that’s all.” — Stephen King
Sometimes our creativity can get stunted by our own hang-ups.
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