The Effect of Fear and Grief on Creativity

Embracing Radical Change — Part Two

In a series of three articles, you’ll be given a perspective on how we might embrace this time of radical change and steer ourselves through the storm of fear and grief and use creativity as a compass to move from isolation to solitude.

We are overwhelmed by a situation that is forcing us to change radically. We are asked to conform to a situation that goes against our human nature. We are asked to dig deep into creative thinking skills to create a new reality. These periods of suffering, discomfort, loss, and failure is where we actually grow. We might not have been ready for what is coming our way and we are not used to dealing with this level of insecurity. But before we can get to a place where we can grow, think forward, and create something new it is important to stand still and embrace our loss.

Loss of normal

The history of pandemics tells us that these are times that evoke fundamental shifts, radical change, and innovation. Norms are being stress-tested and problems are highlighted that we didn’t see before or that we can’t afford to ignore any longer, raising questions we didn’t know had to be answered and we don’t have a quick answer to. Problem-solving asks for a creative mindset. You might find yourself feeling pressured to change, find a solution, and create a new normal. The need to solve this can be extremely high, especially when you lost your job, or you might lose your business, or you are also dealing with a loved one with cancer and the little fun activities you could still do together are no longer an option. When the stress and fear are at such a high, tapping into your creative mindset becomes nearly impossible.

The danger of rejecting fear

We have been conditioned to think we shouldn’t feel scared, we are not supposed to feel fear. We reject feeling our fear or feeling we are failing, feeling we don’t know the answer. We think we should be able to handle the situation. We have been taught to suppress feelings of fear, overwhelm, and failure. But fear belongs, it is natural and intelligent. It tells us to take care of ourselves and make sure we are safe.

Right now fear can feel like a hurricane. The challenge is to be mindful of fear, to find the eye of it, the middle where it is calm. When we get overwhelmed with fear it possesses us, which can become truly debilitating. When we get hijacked by fear we lose contact with our compassion, our perspective, and creativity, our connection to ourselves and our surroundings. This causes a tremendous kind of suffering. We can all feel that fear is very contagious and it becomes widespread. From previous experience, in times of pandemics, it is said that fear can become one of the greatest dangers.

Embracing grief

Before you are able to move to that space of truly opening up to feeling fear, it is important to acknowledge your loss. We acknowledge grief as something we experience related to losing someone dear. This is the grief that we all perceive as socially accepted. But we can also experience grief when we lose a job, a relationship, or something even smaller, like a trip that has been canceled. All change is a change of expectation. Right now we are dealing with a big amount of loss on very different levels. Our lives will be changed forever. In the first weeks, we have been running on adrenaline thinking of how to make quick changes to adapt to what is necessary. Being in this state of running towards safety we didn’t realize that we were leaving behind, that we have lost our normal life.

If we don’t acknowledge and nurture our feelings and repress our emotions, we create toxicity in our body, mind, and soul. We will store it in our bodies which will eventually keep us from moving forward, and it will interfere with our immune system and undermine our overall well-being. Because what we resist persists. This is something we can’t afford, especially now.

When we look closely at loss and grief, there is a different perspective that might be helpful to have us open up and embrace it so that we’ll be able to let it go and move to a place where we can start to look ahead.

When feeling grief, we are not grieving for someone or something, but we are grieving for ourselves. For our own loss. We grieve the loss of shared experience, the experiences we wanted to have, unfinished business. We have taken for granted that it would always be there. This can leave us feeling deeply saddened. When people are in the depth of grief it can leave them paralyzed, unable to make their contributions to the social world. This is the phase of grief that is called isolation.

The risk of isolation

The first reaction to dealing with great loss is denial followed by isolation. We tend to think everything will go back to normal soon, this isn’t real or this isn’t so bad, this can’t be happening. We deny the reality of the situation. Denial is a common defense mechanism that shields the immediate shock of the loss, isolating ourselves from our emotions. We distance ourselves from others and we won’t share our feelings and expression of loss with others.

The transformation of grief from a public rite of passage to a personal, psychological, and intensely private form, has its roots in The Black Death, a pandemic that ruptured the continent’s mourning customs. It continued to evolve from a passage of the departed to the pain of the bereaved to the twentieth century where grief is considered personal, psychological, and intensely private. This has caused us to develop misaligned contemporary attitudes about mortality. We have lost the acknowledgment of loss along with the rituals that used to lead us through dealing with loss.

Isolation, as described in the dictionary, is “the condition of being alone, especially when this makes you feel unhappy” and “the fact that something is separate and not connected to other things”. In this moment being forced to physically distance ourselves, from our loved ones, from providing for our families, from caring for the ill, from saying goodbye to our loved ones who are dying. This type of isolation is needed to minimize disease transmission and while at it, some say it will disrupt some of the division in the world that has been created over the past ages. It is going to bring us closer together and great change will come from this.

The invitation in isolation

There is an invitation to tap into our kind, empathic, loving, creative self plus there is a risk that we become one with the fear, that we freeze and disconnect ourselves from each other. When we are isolated and not supported in carrying our grief and fear, we will have a hard time moving over to this side of inspiration and possibility. Then where do we find that space where they say that we can grow in these periods of suffering, discomfort, and loss?

Are you able to feel the intelligence of the fear and hold it with compassion and create the space for yourself that allows you to grow in a way that strengthens you to deal with whatever is coming your way?

>>From my personal experience of having dealt with a big amount of loss in diverse ways, giving myself the time to sink in and face the loss, sadness, grief, and fear has been the best decision I have made in my life. Learning to surrender to whatever is coming my way and finding space to lovingly let go of what and who was dear to me, digging deep to connect to myself and all my emotions and fears, has shown me the way to my own inner compass, to my creative source, to my inner peace, wisdom, and strength.<<

Five tips to embrace your fear and grief

1. Recognize your loss — This is the first step in making a way to embrace radical change. What has changed, what expectations did you have or what did you loose that was important for you from your old normal that won’t be there in the new normal. Don’t judge yourself, small things count too.
2. Acknowledge what you can not change — Letting go of the need to be in control can create a lot of peace of mind. There is a lot happening that is out of our control. Maya Angelou said “If you don’t like something, change it. If you can’t change it, change your attitude.’’
3. Express your feelings — What do you need in order to allow your feelings. Cry, if you can. But you don’t have to. You can draw, write, scream (in a pillow if you don’t want to share), sing, dance, run, swim. You name it. You will know the answer when you ask yourself. Move from a place of grief, feel it, and set it free, move it out of your body. Do not suppress it and lock it into your precious body, this can cause damage in the long run. Create a ritual to celebrate the good and let go of bad feelings.
4. Allow Support — Ask people you feel supported by, to hold space for you. Let them know they don’t have to fix it or make you feel better. Own your pain, you are strong enough to handle it and care for it. Ask to be held in an open way. You will learn to listen to what you need and then you can ask for the right support.
5. Don’t judge & compare — We are faced with numerous extreme situations. Everyone’s situation is different and everyone has his or her own way of dealing with grief and showing compassion.
6. Find pleasure in the now — Find what makes you feel supported, joyful, relaxed. Even if it is for a moment. A nice warm shower, a piece of chocolate, nice music, clean sheets, listening to the happy song of a bird. Finding pleasure in the small things will relax your nervous system and will create space for positivity and possibility.

Continue reading the next in this series of three:
Part One — Creativity as a compass
Part Two — The Effect of Fear and Grief on Creativity
Part Three — The effect of Solitude on Creativity