Elizabeth Gilbert on fear and being creative
In her TED Talk "Your elusive creative genius" Gilbert comments: "When I was a teenager, when I first started telling people that I wanted to be a writer, I was met with this same sort of fear-based reaction.
"And people would say, "Aren't you afraid you're never going to have any success? Aren't you afraid the humiliation of rejection will kill you? Aren't you afraid that you're going to work your whole life at this craft and nothing's ever going to come of it and you're going to die on a scrap heap of broken dreams with your mouth filled with bitter ash of failure?" (Laughter)
"The answer -- the short answer to all those questions is, Yes, I'm afraid of all those things." (Hear audio clip below.)
In her book "Big Magic: Creative Living Beyond Fear" she points out that “if you didn’t have any fear, you would lead a short, crazy, stupid life.
“You would walk into traffic. You would jump into giant waves off the coast of Hawaii, despite being a poor swimmer…So, yes, you absolutely do need your fear, in order to protect you from actual dangers."
But, she adds, “you do not need your fear in the realm of creative expression. Seriously, you don’t.”
She notes “Just because you don’t need your fear when it comes to creativity, that doesn’t mean fear won’t show up. Trust me, your fear will always show up, especially when you’re trying to be inventive or innovative...It "very much needs to be dealt with” in order to do our creative work.
This is an excerpt from my Creative Mind Audio podcast with clips from Elizabeth Gilbert's TED Talk video, plus her conversation between with Kate Bowler, a New York Times bestselling author, podcast host, and professor at Duke University.
See the full episode, the TED Talk video, plus links to Kate Bowler's podcast, and more, in article Fear and courage and being creative - What does Elizabeth Gilbert say?