Stepping Off Now: Support for Neurodivergent Creatives

A little about my cat Lucy, who has reached the end of her life. 

I used to think the creative life was only for "real" creatives or artists, the lucky few who are able to spend most of their day doing creative work and are probably also making a living from their art. But that's wrong. The creative life is available for anyone who wants it regardless of how much time you spend doing your creative work, and it is certainly not dependent on outside recognition of said work. There are a few simple things you can do to live the creative life, and I tell you about them in this episode.

Have you ever felt like you're living at a distance from your own life, not really immersed in it in a way that feels fulfilling or joyful? The problem could be rooted in our misleading cultural ideas around seeking balance. What we see as finding balance in life is often merely a way of shuffling things around on our already overloaded plates. In this episode I talk about why I gave up on trying to have a balanced life and what I do instead. I also give you some tips on how I manage life without to-do lists, and how to deal with the consequences of letting some of those things fall off your overloaded plate. 

In this episode I tell you what writing my novel, The Gentle History, has looked like. I am an intuitive discovery writer, which means that I rarely sit down with any kind of detailed idea of what I'm going to be writing that day. Whatever comes out when I'm in a flow state is unplanned and spontaneous, and may only loosely connect with my overarching idea of the novel, at least in early drafts. I get to know my characters and story as I go along, refining my ideas in each subsequent draft. This is not an efficient way of writing, but it's inspired, and it's the only way that works for me. If you are struggling with your own writing, this episode will give you some ideas about how to move forward in a creatively inspired way that isn't overly controlling of your process and final product.

You can find the blog post associated with this episode here.

Pete is the Author of The Art of Shouting Quietly (2015) and A Quiet Person's Guide to Life+Work (due May 2022). His latest book is aimed at those who are quiet themselves or who know quiet people, love them, and/or work with or manage them. He identifies as Quiet person, here to support others that identify as quiet. He is an advocate for Quiet inclusion and runs workshops to bring quiet people and those who lead/manage them into alignment. He is a tutor for Barefoot Coaching Ltd – one of the UK’s premier coaching companies – and has a Postgraduate Certificate in Business & Personal coaching from Chester University.

Pete's new book, A Quiet Person's Guide (to life + work).

You can also buy an ebook copy of his new book here.

You can find out more about Pete's talks and workshops here:
https://www.petemosley.com/quietwisdom

Website: www.petemosley.com
Twitter: @petemosley

I get meta in this episode by sharing about my creative practice of writing an ebook about creative practice. I credit my creative practice with everything good in my life, from my recovery from burnout, to finally finding my arena and my people, to finishing a novel, to my mental health management. I want to help other people develop their own life-affirming, fulfilling creative practice that helps them do good work, finish projects, and gives them a sense of purpose in life.

I'm doing this episode for two reasons. The first is that I believe in the value of sharing the creative process. Sharing the act of creativity is what creativity is in the most fundamental sense: alive, in motion, emergent. Creativity is process, not product. The second reason is that this ebook is for you. I'd like feedback on my ideas around what to include. So if you feel like this ebook is something you'd be interested in, please don't hesitate to contact me with your thoughts on what you'd like to see me include! You can contact me here.

In this wide-ranging conversation, artist and fellow PhD Sophia van Hees and I parse the difference between terms such as introversion, shy, socially anxious, reserved, sensitive, and quiet, and discuss our experiences growing up as shy, reserved children in the US and Australia, respectively.

Brave Snail Designs

Sophia's Instagram

Find more info on Sophia's tarot deck here.

Does writer's block exist? Yes it does. In this episode I challenge those who say it's not a real thing by exploring my own recent experience with it. In my opinion, writer's block isn't just being unable to write, it's broader than that, and I talk about why, the reasons behind writer's block, what it looks like, and how I deal with it. This isn't your typical perspective (when is anything I do typical lol), and hopefully it will enlighten you a bit about the condition of writer's block and give you some more tools to deal with it if/when it happens to you. And if you are one of the people saying it doesn't exist in an objective sense, please reconsider! Listen to this episode for why.

You can find the essay I wrote that inspired this episode here.

What do you do when the path ahead seems hopeless, and you feel resignation coming over you? I contemplate this through a personal reckoning with Kierkegaard's contrasting Knight of Faith and Knight of Resignation archetypes.

When You Don't Have the Privilege of Mental Health

I had a discouraging week, and so to cheer myself up I decided to give myself a break from doing a regular podcast episode and read you one of my short stories instead! This is the first time I have shared my fiction on this podcast. The story is called "The Memory of Trees," and it's about a woman going to visit the mother of her childhood best friend, a friend who once shared a terrible secret with her.