So You’re Angry, Relentless, Impatient, Intolerant and Just Plain WEIRD? Join the Club.
“What am I in the eyes of most people – a nonentity, an eccentric, or an unpleasant person – somebody who has no position in society and will never have, in short. The lowest of the low. All right then – even if that were absolutely true, then I should like to show by my work what such an eccentric, such a nobody, has in his heart”
– Vincent Van Gogh
I used to think there was something wrong with me, and that the only way I could ever be happy was to become a better person, to fix the rage and fire within me and learn how to be more patient, more kind, more tolerant, more compassionate and openly loving, not just towards myself perhaps for starters, but towards the world around me.
“What’s wrong with me?!”, I thought, that I can’t seem to focus on what people are saying for more than a millisecond (unless it’s about business or personal development), that the way most Mums spend their time and energy horrifies the shit out of me, that I just don’t CARE about doing home duties or admin or meeting social obligations or even being social at all?
I’m going to die alone an angry bitter person with no friends and nobody around me!
I need to fix this!
I need to fix ME!
Have you ever felt that way? Like there’s something inherently wrong with you where you just … CAN’T. You just can’t seem to be a proper person, for starters! You can’t seem to GIVE a damn about the stuff that most people give their life for, about what life, clearly, is about!
And even the markers of safety and success, the stuff that we ALL know life must include – like a mortgage, a good job, a good car, a good neighbourhood, good social standing, a certain amount of money in the bank for a safety net, and so on – those things just don’t really do it for you. They’re okay … fine … but you just can’t seem to bring yourself to base your life around them.
And you wonder –
When am I going to grow up?!
When am I going to get my shit sorted?
When am I going to BE A REAL ADULT and be RESPONSIBLE?!
Can I tell you?
If you’re an artist with a message that burns deep inside of you then you may as well hear and accept this now:
You’re never going to be normal.
You’re never going to grow up like the rest of the world.
You’re never going to be a calm, organised or rational patient person.
And you will never, ever, EVER fit in.
I was doing a little honest journaling just now about what kind of person I am and the list I reeled off at first without even thinking about it was, shall we say, NOT particularly pleasant.
I’m impatient, intolerant, messy, disorganised.
I’m selfish, demanding, unforgiving, relentless.
I don’t back down, I’m a fucking BITCH a lot of the time, and I simply can’t stomach fools. I can’t seem to hide that either.
I guess that out of all the people who may well judge us for being a crazy creator (and make no mistake, they WILL judge you; your fears are true!), we are our own harshest critics, and so that’s partly why my immediate focus about ‘who I am’ was on the BAD stuff about who I am.
But the truth is …
If I’m being honest, and just laying myself out bare on the table here …
I really can’t imagine letting go of this stuff; of these traits. I don’t WANT to tame the beast! Because as much as I can see that these things make me fucking difficult to live with or possibly even to know, these are the traits which have ALLOWED me to be who I am as a creative, crazy, never say die artist and entrepreneur who believes in a different world.
And when I think about what I’d have to do and who I’d ultimately become, should I push down these parts of myself and learn how to be normal, it just seems so BORING.
I mean, really?
I should enjoy making small talk? I listen at times to Mums in cafes, and look, I get it – I love talking about my kids as well. For 5 minutes. But a whole HOUR OR TWO discussing he said she said he did she did BULLSHIT about the school or the house or your neighbour’s dog? HOW DO PEOPLE DO THIS?! I do NOT get that. I do NOT have the patience, compassion or DESIRE to be ABLE to get that!
And really? I should be okay with making a good home, a household that runs smoothly with everything just so and a meal on the table every night? Fuck. Me. Dead. I honestly have no clue how women (or men) can give their lives day after day for this shit. I find it difficult to believe they’re okay with it, but I guess some are. We’re all different.
But it’s not even really about why I can’t bring myself to embrace the traits of a normal ‘appropriate’ 35 year old woman, mother, wife, etc, it’s about what it would MEAN if I were to let go of all of the things inside of me that at first glance appear so BAD.
Because these BAD and socially WRONG traits are the exact traits which have caused me to be someone who creates her art day in and day out, shares her message from within, and ultimately has made a ton of money and a ton of impact in doing so.
I may not remember to pay the bills … do the dishes … EVER clean … or have ANY clue what’s going on in the ‘real world’ … and nor do I CARE to know …
But I have a fire and a passion so strong that when I let myself, I can make magic.
With my writing.
My speaking.
And my soul.
And here’s what I’ve learned about making magic, about digging deep within to create the work that has always been there inside of you, the work that IS you and you it –
It’s not the kind of thing that happens when you’re trying to keep one foot in the normal world.
Women ask me at times, how I do it.
How am I such a content machine, how do I produce so much day in and day out, how do I always have something to say, and how do I balance it with the house and family and life stuff.
My answer is simple.
I don’t balance it.
My work is my life. My life is my work. I am my work. I am my life.
It’s all just one big mish-mash but who I AM is what I CREATE and so it comes before EVERYTHING.
I don’t CARE if the house looks a certain way.
I don’t CARE if the kids are dressed like mini-pirates or gypsies.
I don’t CARE what’s happening next month or next week or even later today that I have to be aware of or prepare for. I’ll figure that shit out when it comes to the moment!
I don’t CARE what’s going on in the news or in the lives of the people we know.
I just. don’t. care.
And I find it really fucking hard to give me time and energy to stuff I don’t care about.
So I don’t.
This, in case you’re wondering, does not necessarily bode well with those around me. While I may be learning to accept myself for being an intolerant angry irrational lunatic, people who have to deal with it don’t always feel so forgiving.
How I feel about this?
Love me, hate me, this is who I am. And by the way, you can hire people to do all that normal life shit because you can jump up and down about it all you like but I am NEVER GOING TO DO IT.
I do what matters.
For my art.
For my message.
For me.
So I might spend HOURS writing and writing and writing and journaling and much of it seems completely irrelevant to ANYTHING (even to what’s supposed to be being done in my business) but THAT IS WHERE THE MAGIC IS MADE.
By ignoring the musts.
And the shoulds.
Of a normal life.
And I might run around like a crazy person doing mad silly games with the kids, but tidy up their clothes or remember to bath them consistently? Ummm … they get cleaned eventually okay! What I CARE about when it comes to my children is having mad fun together, learning and creating and crafting memories. I do not give two hoots about anything to do with organisation or preparation to do with my kids, and so I don’t do it. Even when they were babies I was always able to get them ready and out the door in under 5 minutes flat, because my FOCUS was on where I wanted to be or what we were doing. I just don’t have it within me to spend time on things like getting ready, not even for babies!
So I don’t.
You wanna know how I create so much content, get so much done, and always have something to say?
It’s because that’s what I focus on.
Day in and day out I ignore my task list, I ignore the things I said I’ll do, I ignore even the stuff I thought I really wanted to do, I cancel appointments, I leave shit everywhere, I show up late or not at all, I explode like a banshee if someone dare to even LOOK at me while I’m doing my art, I have no patience, no time, no consideration for the normal world and it’s demands but what I DO instead?
I make magic.
I ignore the rest.
I dive DEEP within, and I pull stuff out of my soul. I dig into the hidden corners and recesses, the places where the truth hides out, where authenticity is to be found, where POWER comes from.
And I let that shit out.
Messy, organised, chaotic, frenzied, angry, or just plain ODD, whatever comes out comes out?
What it comes down to I suppose is simple:
I’ve learned to be okay with being me.
It’s an ongoing process but I’ve learned to accept that in order for me to create the magic I love and to live a life of flow and fulfillment, you gotta take the bad with the good and that actually the bad? Is not so bad at all. It’s just that it’s not normal, or the done thing, or what might be EXPECTED, but does that mean it’s WRONG?
Well, that’s up to each of us to decide for ourselves, but I can tell you this –
If you refuse to accept yourself as who you are, you won’t give yourself space or permission or emotional support to be who you are and you therefore won’t BE WHO YOU ARE.
Which means you won’t create from what’s inside of you, not really. You may create some surface shit. Some “appropriate” stuff done in an appropriate way whilst maintaining an appropriate balance to life.
Which is all very … appropriate. Good for you that you made a few moments of time for BEING WHO YOU FUCKING ARE after you cleaned the house, paid the bills, ran around responding to the commands of those around you, of society, of the normal world, of your own ridiculous ideals for what a good woman should do.
Sucks for you that you ignored the desire, the voice, the YEARNING within though.
Sucks that you’re still not going there.
Not giving yourself permission, time OR emotional space.
Not letting it be messy, dark, ugly, CRAZY intense but also FUCKING WONDERFUL because that’s what it is when you release your truth.
Doesn’t it … just … kinda suck?
Yep.
I know.
And I know, I know, you want to find a way to be the good wife, the good mother, the good woman, and still work your magic, but honey if I’m gonna be frank with you (and I trust that I can be?), then you need to know this –
Sorry to say –
Sorry to have to be the one to tell you –
But you’re NOT normal.
You’re NOT the good wife, the good mother, the good woman, NOT LIKE THAT.
And who the hell told you what the rules were anyway?! Who said you can’t be the best version of YOU; who said you had to conform to these STANDARDS? Who said that if you don’t keep the house or your life in a certain order then you’re a BAD FUCKING PERSON.
Well, sure – plenty of people might say it.
But you’re the one who gets to take it on board for you, or not.
And what it comes down to is simple, and irrefutable:
You can’t have it both ways.
You do NOT get to be the good woman, the appropriate lady, and live the normal life and simultaneously be a mad crazy weird who has MAGIC INSIDE OF HER AND LETS IT OUT.
Who are you?
And who are you trying to be?
I can tell you that life is much simpler when you stop beating up on yourself about this shit.
Stop WORRYING about it.
For the stuff that you want to ensure it DOES get done, around the house or in life in general, pay someone to do it!
For your relationships, decide what actually MATTERS to you in those relationships. I value immensely time spent with my kids in the ways I listed above, but time spend being an organised prepared Mum, whatever the fuck that would look like? I’m pretty freaking sure I don’t even know how to do that and I am DEFINITELY sure I don’t want to do that.
For the admin or maintenance or growth side of your business, the stuff that isn’t classified as you doing your art or working your magic but yet you’ve deemed it important (aka pretty much everything except going into your creative crazy on the fly madness and unleashing what comes out) you delete it, you delegate it, or you designate a set time once or twice a week where you knuckle down and do it.
But don’t make your day to day about that shit.
Not in business and not in life.
If you MUST step into a normal person or ‘real entrepreneur’ role from time to time, then do so in short and heavily-boundaried blocks of time and only if it is something you have DEFINITELY decided is worth your own personal time and attention.
Most of the time, the stuff you think you have to do you really do NOT have to do.
So pay careful attention to where you’re taking on board the expectations of the normal world, and ask yourself –
Am I trying to be of the normal world anyway?
Because I don’t know about you …
But this crazy angry bitch has no desire to be normal.
And the art I’ve created, the magic I’ve woven, and the business and impact I’ve built a a result?
That shit didn’t come from normal.
It came from giving a fuck about what I actually give a fuck about, and the rest be damned.
Does this make me irrational, infuriating, selfish, ludicrous in my beliefs and ideals and just plain WEIRD?
Hell yes.
And thank God for that.
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