Living From Your Creative Center

As we strive to meet the demands of our work, families, and communities, many of us understandably put our creativity on a “back burner” hoping to return to it someday, when things slow down.

But things never slow down.

Though keeping creativity “on the side” might seem like a logical strategy for limiting what is on our plates, the results are deeply painful, leaving us vulnerable to depression, disconnection, and burnout.

When we cut ourselves off from our creativity, we also become estranged from our deepest sources of aliveness, joy, and self-connection.

In this course, we try on a different approach: intentionally shifting our center of gravity to our deep creative core, so we can bring authenticity and aliveness to ALL we do - our work, art, activism, and care.

Yes, this is radical.

We are talking about opting out of the soul-crushing value systems that teach us to derive our sense of worth from relentless busyness and goal-chasing and/or sacrificing ourselves to the needs of others.

Putting our creativity at the center is not based on a narrow definition of creativity as “art making,” but rather an expansive definition of creativity as a way of being and doing that values deep, authentic, reciprocal engagements with ourselves and the world.

If you are a woman who is:

• Determined to remain fully human and fully alive in dehumanizing and frightening times

• Tired of band-aiding with shallow “self-care” practices and looking for a more fundamental shift

• Eager to be an empowered agent for foundational changes and new possibilities

• Ready to re-center your life so that it speaks of your joy and your deepest values

This is a workshop for you!

What You’ll Do in the Living From Your Creative Center Program:

Through conversation, self-reflection, and hands-on activities, we’ll explore three threads that weave through all of our lives:  Productivity, Creativity, and Care, and experiment with re-weaving this braid in a more humane and self-affirming way. 

You will:

• Learn how Productivity got normalized as the dominant ethos of our culture, and how it has shaped our beliefs about purpose, worth, value, and even our understanding of time.

• Explore the key elements of the Ethos of Creativity - what are the beliefs, mindsets, and aspirations that creators share?

• Discover how Productivity culture has limited and distorted our understanding of both Creativity and Care and embrace a more expansive understanding of Creativity as a coherent, life-affirming value system.

• Find out how the extremes of Productivity and Care both require self-negation, and learn the warning signs that you are moving into the Danger Zones of self-abdication, resentment, and burnout.

• Practice healthier, more life-affirming ways to interweave our commitments to work, family, art, and community.

Participants Enjoy

• 4 live, interactive lecture and discussion sessions

• Interactive digital workbooks with activity and reflection prompts

• Private online discussion space

• Access to replay recordings and lecture slides

The Flow of the Course

Week 1: A Tale of Three Ethoses
A brief history of Productivity, Creativity, and Care.
How did we come to a place where care and creativity are seen as “on the side” of work, instead of being the most essential human work?

Week 2: Putting Creativity at the Center
Exploring the ethos of creativity and claiming your zone of creative thriving.
What changes about how we engage in care and work when we are grounded in the values and mindsets of creativity?

Week 3: The Dark Edges of Productivity and Care
Identifying the toxic extremes of productivity and care, and learning strategies for returning to center.
How can we find our way back home to our creative selves when life pulls us in other directions?

Week 4: Reclaiming Our Time; Remembering Our Power
Expanding our time vocabulary and expressing our intrinsic power.
How do creators experience time differently, and how might we use our power to advocate in little and big ways for the values we share as creators?