Jen Perrine

If you would have told me 15 years ago that I would be running a creative business from my home, I would have stared back at you in utter disbelief. You see I was that kid who avoided art class, who hated the messiness of art and preferred to stay in what felt like more tangible, controllable arenas. I simply wanted no part in the creative realm. And deeper still, I felt as if I had no business being there. A chasm between the artist and the rest of the world existed. Creativity was in a very confined box, only to be opened by the chosen few.

Over the years, season by season, layer upon layer, I have come to understand that as Elizabeth Gilbert says, “In creativity, no one is left out of the inheritance.” Every single individual is unique and possesses a creativity all their own that longs to be unleashed to the world. There is no one that wholly possesses your thoughts, emotions, experiences, or ideas and therefore only you can be an agent of your unique creativity.   But like anything of value and beauty in this world, lies came against creativity and taint its original intention. I have seen in the lives of others, as well as in my own experience, that shame and fear are the biggest liars and most corruptive to our creative nature.

It is amazing how simple off-handed comments or experiences growing up introduced shame into my creative nature. I remember a seemingly small moment in my education where I worked and worked at cursive writing. I just couldn’t get it right. I would erase through paper upon paper trying to form the letters perfectly, and I remember my 8-year-old self declare, “I will never get this. Can’t the teacher just accept that I am not creative?!” I have no idea why those words came out at such a young age, related to such a small task.  But the roots took hold right there and continued to spread as I declared over myself again and again: I am not creative. I just stopped trying. A fear of failure sank into my identity that clouded many seasons and stunted many opportunities.

And then, around the age of 25, I had a teacher challenge my misconstrued idea of creativity. He was so passionately convinced that creativity is an inherit gift to humanity, a mark of being an image bearer of God that he yelled at us, “Stop killing yourself. Stop stripping yourself of creativity or you strip yourself of the image of God.” Those words shook my core and invited me on a path to discover my own creativity. God slowly began to untangle the lies, to unravel my attempts to quantify and limit my creativity and contain it within the realm of the artist.

And now here I am a maker, producing a product others conceive to be art. It still absolutely baffles me. But here is what I have discovered. Creativity has nothing to do with what it produces and everything to do with the transformative process. God has used my pursuit of creativity to transform so many parts of my heart, my character, and my experiences. I was listening to a podcast called “Cultivating Creativity” by Melissa Helser the other day and she said, “Creativity is your birthright. Remove the pressure. The point of creativity is to bring you joy and produce good fruit.”

Pressing into a creative business the last few years has been fraught with difficult, transformative moments. It has confronted a deep fear of failure, the paralyzing kind that shuts down your soul. I have grappled with this idea that I am a fraud if I don’t produce something wholly “original” which feels next to impossible in a social media saturated world. I have waded in the deep waters of comparison and come to discover there is enough room in this world for everyone’s ideas and products.  We each have our unique beauty to birth into the world and better to cheer one another on than to plague ourselves with judgment and competition. I discovered creativity is not disconnected from hard work. Ideas don’t simply come to us in some mystical way that requires little of our own agency to bring it forth. Creativity is a practice, a decision to notice the smaller moments curiosity invites you to experience and shake off fear of the unknown. It can be tedious and hard, but I have seen that if I press through the monotony, inspiration comes and those efforts transform how I bear the image of God. The difficult seasons sometimes produce the best harvest in our souls.

In the hard moments of the business, I ask myself why I am doing this, pursuing something that seems to steal so much of my time and produces so little. But again, I try to quantify what I produce and fail to notice the unseen. Elizabeth Gilbert in her podcast with Krista Tippet says, “Your life is the work of art, not what you produce.” God keeps asking me to stay in the deep end of this small business, where I am growing stronger and cultivating a discipline of staying in the crucible even when I don’t see the purpose. I stay on the path, not because I understand where it is going to take me but because I know I will be transformed with each step I take. I have learned to give myself grace that just being in motion on the path is a big deal. It is not in what I produce or how I perceive my creativity, but that I continue to show up and move forward.

So where are you killing your creativity? What lies are crippling the way you were meant to put your unique imprint on the world? The beauty of who you are isn’t in what you produce. The beauty is already there, waiting to be cultivated and revealed. To break free from the grasp of our fear and shame. Step on the path and simply start moving forward.

What stirs at the mention of “self-care”? What pictures come to mind? The concept of self-care is presently all over social media, specifically targeted toward women. Go to a women’s retreat, and it will likely be in the headline of a breakout session. Listen in on a group of moms and you may find them lamenting over the absence of self-care or the determination to “do better”. It is a buzz word in the women’s community at large, but why? And to what purpose?

The dictionary describes self-care as “the regular practice of taking an active role in protecting one’s own well-being”.

Let’s break down this definition a little bit. The “regular practice” of self-care implies this isn’t a haphazard thing to be pursued at leisure and when time readily permits. Rather, it suggests self-care is a discipline. This practice needs to be woven into the very fabric of our everyday lives. It requires us to take an “active role” in refilling ourselves that we might pour into the things bringing meaning and purpose to our lives. When self-care invokes emotions of frustration and begins an inward dialogue telling me it is out of reach, I realize I have set other things as a higher priority rather than operate from a spirit of intention and discipline.

I love the inclusion of the word “protecting” in the definition of self-care. It reminds me first that self-care has an inherit value and therefore my well-being is worth the fight. Part of protecting self-care is enforcing boundaries. It feels as if there is a voice whispering to women that we have to do it all, all the time, and with perfection. Do you hear it? Giving into that voice seems easier than the vulnerability and effort of a “no”, but continually saying “yes” comes at a great price. Each time we push out an insincere yes, we lose a piece of ourselves in the process.

Daring to set boundaries is about having the courage to love ourselves, even when we risk disappointing others…Only when we believe, deep down, that we are enough can we say “Enough!” Brené Brown

Protecting our well-being also takes a tribe. When an elephant is about to begin labor, her tribe of female elephants will gather around her to protect her from predators as she brings new life into the world. What a beautiful picture of the need we have as women to be protected by each other in our most vulnerable moments. I am so thankful to be tethered to a community of women who challenge me to dig deeper and push forward in becoming the type of woman I want my daughters to follow.

I believe self-care is a common topic in women’s circles because the superficial pursuit of self-care has given women who are thirsty for purpose a hollow “treat” to tie them over. The world often pushes us into the shallow end of self-care. But we were not made for the shallow but for the deep where life is found. If someone wanted to tear down your purpose, wouldn’t distraction be the perfect ploy? Not too obvious but subtle and deceptively nonchalant.

So often the pursuit of self-care brings me to a crossroads: to check out or to press in. I am strongly tempted by the quick fix in this busy, tiring season of young motherhood. The Netflix binge. The wine and chocolate. Buying the new mudcloth pillow I don’t need. There is nothing wrong with these avenues of self-care at times. However, self-care is not just wine and a bubble bath. It is mustering the discipline to press right into the hard. To do the very things which compel us to confront our gravest fears and our greatest limitations. It is digging into the darkest, hardest part of our heart to break free. If you want to see an example of pressing in to gain freedom, look no further than Taryn’s post last month. It is protecting our own well-being to gain the energy and the life we so long to bring to those around us.

“Only when we are brave enough to explore the darkness will we discover the infinite power of our light.” -Brené Brown

I know this seems intense. I know what it is to need a break and a deep breath. There are days when I need to relax and have absolutely no expectations of myself. Times where a latte and shopping trip are in order. When I speak of checking out, I refer more to those aimless, unintentional bouts of life that come and seem to steal pieces of who we are. We set no intention to life, no pursuit of goals and growth and begin drifting into the shallow.

I feel like I am currently pulling myself, my heart, out of a shallow season. Midnight feedings, cold cups of coffee, and keeping my head above water with all of the transition and adjustment that comes from having 3 babies in 5 years made it hard to have the energy to grow. And it’s OK! We all have those seasons in our lives. But if we stay too long, if we put our own growth and well-being on the back burner for too long, we begin to lose sight of ourselves. In this season, I have been drifting. But with His strength, I am slowly, intentionally wading back into the deep one discipline at a time.

For the beauty of walking with God is we only need muster the strength and discipline to invite Him to walk into the hard moments with us. I am learning my own strength only brings weariness and drives me back to the shallow. But pressing into His strength leads to breakthrough. God will meet us there and show us that depth is where life happens. Then we will drink deeply and walk away satisfied.

Winter is a time of stripping down to our barest selves; a time to choose to see the beauty in what seems barren. The cold invites the opportunity to embrace the early dark with candlelight and a timely book. The new year renews a passion for self-growth when outside life lies dormant. Winter exposes. It invites us to breath deep and quiets our soul that we might explore the raw, tender places of our truest self. It is a season of vulnerability.

 

As a mother of three young girls, quiet is difficult to find, time alone elusive. Yet when the desperately desired still would come, I found myself filling it with static. A Netflix binge, countless minutes perusing Instagram, busying my hands folding the unending pile of laundry. Whatever the task, I was hiding. I began to sift through the layers of excuses. I deserve the break. Can’t I just check out after hours of engagement? This needs to get done now. No energy remains to read or do something that feeds my soul. Strip away the layers, and I discovered I was lonely. I was empty. The static offered distraction but little solace. Truth be told, I had forgotten how to be alone. I had forgotten how to be still. Rather than fill my soul, I filled the silence.

Instead of planting our solitude with our own dream blossoms, we choke the space with continuous music, chatter, and companionship to which we do not even listen. It is simply there to fill the vacuum. When the noise stops, there is no inner music to take its place. We must re-learn to be alone.     -Gift From the Sea

 

Stepping away from social media, taking the TV out of the bedroom, making spaces of beauty to simply reflect and practice stillness: all of these were first steps in regaining the quiet my soul so desperately craved. I had to convince myself that an hour of solitude was a reasonable ambition in order to actual seek and obtain it. As mothers, as women, we get lost amidst the chaos, the busyness, the noise of our every day lives. Yet I am finding with each static-filled day, my soul withers. The withered soul of a woman leaves a story of beauty untold. Beauty the current world is longing to experience; a source of comfort and life in a time of winter.

We named our middle daughter Willow Eve, proclaiming she will be a tree of life that will not yield to the elements, declaring she will bend yet not break. A willow tree can be a rich source of life and wonder but only if they remain planted beside a source of water. Static dehydrates. We cannot weather the chaos of the day and become a source of life to those around us without quieting our souls and planting our roots in a spring of life greater than ourselves.

We are aware of our hungers and needs, but still ignorant of what will satisfy them. With our garnered free time, we are more apt to drain our creative springs than to refill them…not knowing how to feed the spirit, we try to muffle its demands in distractions.     -Gift from the Sea

What are your distractions? How is your soul withering? Where are the raw, tender places you need to explore and heal? How can you return to a quiet soul and access an inner spring that satisfies?

I am learning to quiet my soul, to invite the clarity winter brings. I ask questions to safeguard the inner spring from the invasion of dehydrating static. Does the noise I am inviting enhance the present moment? Am I exchanging the generation of a thought, an idea, a thing of beauty for a mere distraction? Am I depriving those around me from the life I could offer if I only I would silence the noise?

My voice matters. Your voice matters, women. Whatever lies or static is convincing you otherwise, strip it away. Let winter prune the places stifling your beauty. Gain clarity and then move into spring. The world is longing for your beauty. It is desperate for your voice.