What it takes to do your creative work
It takes a certain vulnerability to do your work in the world—to write, to create, to build your soul’s business. It just does.
I spent years in the corporate world; I wore a black suit and carried a laptop like they were armor. The rules of how to be helped me learn quickly how to do well. People loved having me on their team; I turned client engagements. Which was all good.
I knew how to be.
Which was all good, I thought, except there was this thing that wouldn't leave me alone. Writing. I wanted to write. Essays, stories, poems. I didn't know which, only that the longing felt constant.
Why didn't I just do it, you might ask.
I had pens. I had journals. I said I didn't have time. And that certainly felt true - a big job with global teams, a house, a husband, two small children.
But looking back, I see it wasn't time that I lacked.
But rather, a willingness to be vulnerable. A willingness to say ‘yes, I'm going to try this thing that my heart wants so badly.’ To say that while holding in that same heart the fear I might not be able to do it. That if I ever sat down and truly wrote, would my words sing? Would they touch people? Would they inspire, make them feel something?
Would my words matter?
To hold all of that in your heart—not knowing if the answer will be yes, knowing it could well be no—and declare to your very self you're going to do it anyway? That is being vulnerable.
Sometimes yes is a power statement. But sometimes we arrive at it, trembling and unsure, but willing to try anyway.