Fix Your Internal Creative Marriage
For real creativity, get your conscious mind and your subconscious mind to work with each other, not against each other.
Sonnet 116
Shakespeare (or perhaps Edward de Vere?) wrote, ‘Let me not to the marriage of true minds, admit impediments.’
He was writing about two people. But the same applies to two key aspects of you: the conscious, analytical and critical mind; and the subconscious, poetic and creative mind.
They coexist in all of us – but too often like a married couple separated under one roof, not even sharing the same bed.
In my case, I call one of those people Caliban. And he certainly thinks he wears the pants.
Beware the dominant inner critic
‘Don’t embarrass yourself. Anything you come up with has already been done better by someone else. No matter how many redrafts you do, it’ll never be any good. Just forget it.’
Meet my inner critic, Caliban. Constantly looking over my shoulder, telling me what I’ve got wrong. Even while I’m writing it.
If I let him loose, I’m doomed. Whatever work I do is hedged around with so many self-protective caveats that it’s incomprehensible at best, and meaningless at worst. Worse still, he turns the creative part of me into a quivering, unproductive mess, cowering in the corner in case it gets slapped in the face with a wet fish again.
And yet, he can also be very useful. Like fire, he’s a great servant, but a terrible master. He’s superb at identifying weaknesses in my writing, as long as I can get him to do it in a helpful way, instead of just stomping all over my creativity.
So: how do you get the two halves of your mind to work together—each bringing its strengths to the table while leaving its worst habits outside the door?
One tool that works for me is the Imagination Book (see Give Your Subconscious a Playground ).
But before that could help, I had to establish a routine that gave both sides of my mind clear roles and strong boundaries. And I had to stick with it long enough for the relationship to change.
My Three-step Process
1. The Night Before
Spend the last ten minutes of each writing day identifying what you’re wrestling with—what you need to do next, and what’s blocking it. Turn that into a one-sentence instruction to your subconscious. Define a task so simply and clearly that you could accomplish it in fifteen minutes if you knew the answer.
Write the sentence down. Then, as you’re falling asleep, run it through your mind.
2. The Morning After
Give yourself exactly fifteen minutes. No more, no less. Set an alarm.
Remind yourself of the question, and start writing. Whatever comes to mind. No hesitation, no going back. Keep writing until the alarm goes off, and stop the instant it does—even if you’re on a roll.
3. Let It Breathe
Save the document and close it. You’re not allowed to look at it again for forty-eight hours. You may never need to revisit it, but even if you do, let it rest.
Go for a short walk. Clear your head. Then return to where you left off yesterday, and start writing. If the subconscious session has unblocked you, great—go with it. Don’t try to recreate what you wrote in those fifteen minutes; it will speak when it needs to.
If you’re still stuck, redefine the question—and repeat the process that night.
Marriage Counselling for your Creativity
I find it useful to think of this as marriage counselling for the two halves of your creative mind.
Marriage Counsellor/Researcher John Gottman says that the surest sign that a marriage is in trouble is contempt, and contempt is what my strong inner critic wants to show my shy creative side.
You may be the same. Or perhaps your creative side is the one that shows contempt to your rational analytic side, who is only trying to help your creative side achieve things in the real world.
Whichever way round you are, you need to create a process that helps each partner respect what the other brings, while also feeling confident in its own contribution.
And you need to practice that process until it becomes a habit. Otherwise, under pressure, you’ll revert to old patterns.
In my case, I have to empower my conscious mind’s ability to plan, analyse and articulate, while preventing it from leaping in to destroy. And I have to reassure my subconscious mind that it’s free to put forward ideas – even crazy ones – without getting stomped on.
Your “marriage” may be different. But your conscious and subconscious don’t need a divorce. They need to find a way to live together productively.
The two are far more creative side by side than face-to-face.
