Two weeks ago, the creative obsession kicked in as I shifted my attention back to a fiction novel I am writing. Along with the book, I am adapting The Digital Prairie manuscript to a play.
After two books, I’ve learned when my behavior shifts the manuscript is ready to be written. The awareness is more significant with the third book.
Almost overnight, every part of my being becomes consumed with writing. I eat the same lunch. I wear black and listen to the same song on YouTube not once or twice but 50 times or more. My ability to singularly focus on one task is amazing.
I am a vehicle for something greater than myself. My soul is determined to write and refuses to allow anything to get in its way.
Artists and entrepreneurs are made from similar DNA. Launching a business, writing a book, and creating music is art.
All of these endeavors are part of the creative process.
I am learning to honor and accept my quirky behaviors. I write at late at night when my mind has the freedom to explore what is hidden beneath the surface during the day.
The creative obsession has been the focus of many studies as researchers work to determine why creatives become obsessed with their work.
From personal experience, my brain doesn’t like to focus on clothes or food because when you are in a creative flow, making decisions is annoying. Which, I believe explains our need to eliminate non-essential decisions. I imagine my brain, taking its arms and sweeping everything off the table that is irrelevant to the creative process.
During the creative obsession, you search for a time to create. For many, it is either the stillness of the night, early in the morning or both.
This fall, I’ve discovered the peacefulness at 4:30 am which is unmatched by any other time during our 24 hour period. It’s when everything, all our worries and the world’s chaos, seems for a brief moment to fade into the background. The new day is beginning, it’s fresh and clean.
When I’m alone with the computer, songs playing over and over in my ear buds, I savor the time. I protect this time.
Our creativity is our humanity.
In the depths of the night, I came across an interview with Pat Benatar and her husband, Neil Giraldo, at 2016 SXSW Music session. Pat talked about the importance of protecting our art. Our creative expression is a freedom that we should never take for granted.
I write with urgency. I write with a purpose. I write because I need to express what is in my soul. Sleep feels unimportant until the words appear on paper.