Creative Insecurity

How About a Little Insecurity?

“For me, every day is a new thing. I approach each project with new insecurity, almost like the first project I ever did. And I get the sweats. I go in and start working, I'm not sure where I'm going. If I knew where I was going, I wouldn't do it.”

Frank Gehry (American Architect)

To be human is to be insecure. At the moment in our primordial history that we became self-aware, we became insecure. If you've had a child, you've actually lived through this dawning; you see it when your infant goes from being content in anyone's arms, to wanting only Mother's arms. Insecurity is inherent in human nature. Most of us assume that it is synonymous with neurosis. We think we must have some fatal flaw if, as adults, we still feel uncertain and in need of guidance; this is especially true for men. To admit to feeling inadequate is not manly in our culture. It is this fear that fuels bravado and the 'control at all cost' attitude that many of us live with every day.

But, what if you were told that insecurity is a good thing; that it is a critical part of the creative process. Approaching something with 'beginners mind' is crucial to originality. When we approach a new project, whether it's urban renewal, or knitting, or planting a garden, a good question to ask is 'what wants to happen here?' How do you imagine it? What are the colors; what is the shape, the fragrance, the feel? Allowing the flow of images, light, possibilities, to come to you is the beginning of ingenuity. That's different from saying, “I'm going to do this my way. It will look like I want it to and I want it to look like this.” With that attitude, you are immediately boxed in, no matter how good you are, or what the project may be. Who was it who said that an 'expert' is someone who has nothing else to learn?

I realize that there is crippling insecurity, and that some people cannot even leave their homes because of it. That is truly pathological and requires professional intervention. But there is no need to throw the baby out with the proverbial bath water. Keeping a little creative insecurity opens the door to guidance from within and without, and almost always arrives at just the right place.

In the spirit,

Jane