You feel its hot breath on the back of your neck — searing, unrelenting, suffocating. A sick dread washes over you. It’s back. How long has it been there? Why won’t it leave you alone? The first time it attacked, it caught you completely off guard. Blindsided, it sent you reeling. Now, you stay hyper-vigilant, aware of its slightest move. Who let this monster in?
Who gets to enjoy the freedom to create?
Six-year-old Edie loves art. Most kids her age are free to love whatever excites them. Until a Creative Monster does something about it. Julia Cameron coined the phrase in her book, The Artist’s Way. Cameron spent a good portion of her adult life living in the shadow of other people’s creativity. She decided to take a hard look at why that was so, and went on a journey of deep understanding. She wrote the book to help people find their way out of creative quagmire.
No need to look under the bed
Most people have encountered Creative Monsters. Chances are, the run-in occurs at an age too young to have the coping skills to deal with it. Edie painted a picture in an after-school art club. Her mother, Gemma, kindly gave permission for all of us to view it by posting it on Twitter. Per Edie, her teacher told her she did the painting “wrong.” Gemma was concerned because art is Edie’s favorite subject. Now, Edie felt bad about her painting and herself. Again, Edie is six years old.
A six-year-old can’t possibly be emotionally equipped to deal with unqualified rejection from an adult. Luckily for Edie, her mother’s post also requested support for Edie’s artistic endeavor — and she got it, thankfully, a lot of it. The post went viral. Let’s hope Edie doesn’t have to deal with any more Creative Monsters, at least, not until she’s older and better equipped to see them for what they are.
So what’s a Creative Monster?
Cameron described two types of frustrated artists: Shadow Artists and Creative Monsters. A self-proclaimed Shadow Artist, for years Cameron lived in the shadow of some extremely successful people — Martin Scorsese, for one. Shadow Artists are afraid to express themselves creatively, but aren’t willing to give up art entirely. They need to be as close to it as possible. So they glom onto someone who has it figured out. That way, they get to enjoy being around art and artists without sticking their neck out and risking rejection. Though it may seem to solve the problem superficially, the tension of the underlying need to create festers over time.
Creative Monsters, on the other hand, grab the reigns of other people’s desire to create. They often take jobs related to the arts such as teachers, editors, art directors, gallery owners, curators, talent agents... Well, the list goes on. Don’t get me wrong, there are lots of people holding these positions who are in a good place with their creativity and use it to accomplish their role. These people are supportive and constructive sounding boards to artists around them. They do productive, honoring, valuable work. We’re lucky to have them.
Creative Monsters, on the other hand, project their fears onto the artists they encounter. They don’t realize that’s what they’re doing. They believe in their own impossibly high standards, unique aesthetic and impeccable taste. They rarely do a good job of explaining their rejection — certainly not in a constructive way. They are experts at being dismissive and delivering subtle condemnation. The tone of their message goes beyond the issue at hand. It ridicules the artist for even trying — the very thing the Creative Monster is most afraid to do.
Example, please
A wonderful example of a Creative Monster is in Jane Austen’s novel, Pride and Prejudice. Darcy’s aunt, Lady Catherine, judges Elizabeth’s musical ability at the piano forte as lacking and admonishes her to practice more. As an aside, Lady Catherine offers that she, herself, never learned to play, but is certain, “If I had ever learnt, I should have been a great proficient.”
Lady Catherine gets away with being a Creative Monster because she is rich and socially powerful. Her one creative ability seems to be making the people around her miserable.
Second chance?
Creative Monsters typically do not offer much hope for improvement. They don’t give helpful advice that you can use to address a specific issue in order to grow and further your talent. Their “feedback” is hopelessly lacking in expertise. It’s something they “just know.” They often declare that whatever is lacking cannot be taught. You either have it or you don’t. The implication being that you don’t.
Who is at the center of this, anyway?
Not you. Not the one being “critiqued.” The Creative Monster can’t even see you, or what you’ve created, for that matter. All the Creative Monster sees is the threat of their own failure. The fear that they don’t have talent haunts them. They need to pretend it’s you and not them that’s the problem. So they make you and your creative expression the problem. The beauty of it for them is that there’s no way for you to respond. If you accept their criticism, you’re doomed. If you defend against it, well, you just don’t want to hear the truth.
Is there hope?
If you recall spending hours coloring, or if your family’s refrigerator was covered with your art, or if you made sculptures out of whatever you found outside, there’s an artist inside you wanting to express. If you liked to sing and dance, or if you made up plays for your stuffed animals, there’s a performer dying to get on stage. There’s a reason the unique expression of art satisfies like nothing else can. Our brains are wired for it. But rather than dwell on why you don’t make art any more, the point is to go ahead and make it. The best way to take the plunge is to silence the Creative Monster in your head.
The Artist’s Way is a twelve-module plan for undertaking the journey back to that free little kid inside who wants to experience the joy of making stuff happen. You can fly solo, or you can find other people to share the journey. I joined a group of 11 other people. We met once a month. Each of us took a turn leading a module. Over the course of that year I experienced a creative surge unlike ever before.
There was camaraderie, compassion, communion. These people were in the creative trenches with me. I think it would have been a very different journey alone. My bias is to recommend finding people to join you who are not friends and family. You want to be free to speak your truth. Sometimes, a group of strangers with a common goal can offer what those closest to us cannot.
Feeling any twinges?
So if you can recall a time when you received “feedback” that made you feel hopeless, there’s a good chance you were dealing with a Creative Monster. If the hurt from that day still resonates, it still influences you. Chances are, the Creative Monster isn’t in your life anymore, except in your head. But even if they are, insight is empowering. It can help you take back what is yours, and enable you to never give it away again.
As for any Creative Monsters out there, consider the quote below that Mostafa Ibrahim posted to Twitter in response to Edie’s experience:
May you never be the reason why someone who loved to sing, doesn’t anymore. Or why someone who dressed so uniquely, now wears plain clothing. Or why someone who always spoke so excitedly about their dreams, is now silent about them. May you never be the reason someone gave up on a part of themselves because you were demotivating, non-appreciative, hypercritical, or even worse — sarcastic about it.
Video courtesy of Mark Lund licensed under CC BY 3.0
This video uses this sound from freesound.org:
Eerie Ambience courtesy of Bradovic (https://freesound.org/people/Bradovic/sounds/171992/) licensed under CC0 1.0
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