Creativity & Conflict: A Dance with Healing & Growth

While conflict in its many forms can catalyze our creative process it is also just as likely to lead to stasis when not engaged with creative life force. When exploring how creativity and conflict influence one another, I find it useful to consider the following question:

What is the nature of conflict?

From a conscious perspective one can reasonably state that war, the absolute conflict, is never righteous. To wage war upon another human, nation, species, or any living organism must be the last resort. A war is not truly won due to its destructive nature. Yet that is the intention. And so it is with any disagreement when the intention of the conflict is to win. At best, war may be a necessity to maintain alignment with right action. An acknowledgement that reconciliation is not seen as possible. That it’s not possible to achieve clarity and accountability between two or more parties. A clarity and accountability not available because the parties are unwilling to place in trust their true aspirations within the conflict. Their agendas are veiled. The veil exists because of the belief that they can win the conflict. This belief in our culture is perpetuated by romanticized notions of victory in conflict.

In contrast, when the goal within a given conflict is centered on creating clarity and mutual accountability the result looks radically different. New possibilities rooted in creative life force emerge where there was once sheer conflict. One of the key elements of navigating conflict is the willingness to be vulnerable. To be vulnerable in the midst of a conflict in any context is an act of great courage. It also facilitates creativity, leading to resolution. Another way of seeing such a resolution is recognizing within the vulnerability the component of grief. Within grief there is a letting go into the depths of our being. We are open to trust in that moment. To something profound within ourselves that can transform the nature of the conflict.

In the headline photo, taken by Nathan Howard for AP/Reuters, during the Portland BLM protests in the summer of 2020, we see the naked woman, known as Athena - a reference to the Greek goddess of war - arrive within the zone of conflict nearly surrounded by Federal officers. A short time after she took her position, the officers simply withdrew from the zone of conflict. Athena’s act offered a profound and transformative moment, born into the world by her willingness to be vulnerable, creative and courageous.

Creation is the only outcome of trouble or conflict that can truly satisfy the Soul ~ William Blake

I have heard it said that conflict is the byproduct of a breakdown in imagination and/or creativity. Within the practice of presence we can see imagination and creativity as discernibly different. Imagination is the byproduct of the untethered thinking mind and lacks a firm connection to presence, to the moment. Creativity, on the other hand, is born within presence and carries the gift of the infinite nature of the Soul. The Soul, within its mission to serve our Healing & Growth, gives creativity a potency largely missing within the untethered imagination. This perspective yields the opportunity to see conflict resolution as a creative process. One centered upon discerning between a life event, circumstance or reaction to life and the underlying creative opportunity that exists through a practice in emotional presence and surrender. A surrender into our deeper truth that serves to transform the moment. Such a practice allows us to see with clarity the need of the moment and within personal accountability, the will to honor our personal truth.

The nature of flow and creativity is a close correlation to how freely we allow ourselves to feel what is going on within us and around us. If we use the example of the suffering artist - “I need to suffer in order to create” - we can see the duality of the belief. The truth lies in the need to feel our emotions in order to create but it is not true that we must suffer to create or that suffering is inherently part of the creative process.

The story that creation is inherently suffering is in many ways an expression of what I call the ascension myth. It is built upon the belief that if success is ascension, that to let go into a creative opening is a failure. It wasn’t earned. The earning in this case is the suffering one must undergo in overcoming an obstacle in order to create something anew in the world. This sweat equity earned through suffering is so ingrained in the modern human psyche that most creative endeavors build this need to suffer into the process of creation. This belief has been built by a culture that has increasingly abandoned the need for feeling and replaced it with a cognitive approach. The tragic nature of the ascension myth is the belief that we can think our way up the ladder of success. Our ascension up the ladder is built upon mental suffering. This is not to negate thought. Thought though needs to be processed through our feelings rather than as a negation of emotion. In truth, we descend optimally in presence, into our feelings, to process the moment and grieve it. By letting go into our feelings we allow ourselves a fresh new moment to follow. This occurs in lieu of mentally carrying our pain forward in thought. This soulful wholistic approach to a creative life removes the need to ascend through unnecessary obstacles.

While it can be seen as a tired trope, the notion that we are creative beings living a corporeal life only appears tired because humanity is tired. Tired mentally, physically and emotionally. Our spirits however are intact. It may not feel that way because the connection to spirit can be so tenuous when not well-rested. We are in truth spiritually vibrant but the signal is faint because the patterns of non-presence, or habitual patterns of worry or chronic sadness, make more noise when we are fatigued. Contrary to the calls for actions from those sounding the alarm of things falling apart in the world, the great need of the moment is to rest and slow down. To step into a simpler way of being. To follow the Four Forms of Rest and observe the return to vibrancy in our life. From that creative place within us, anything is possible, both individually and collectively.