Sometimes creativity feels like a racetrack: when your creative vehicle is running smooth and fast, you’re zipping along the track, keeping up with the flow of ideas traveling all around you. But when your creativity hits a bump and you get a flat tire, you pull over to the side and start to watch the colourful world you were once part of zip past at such a speed that it feels like there is no way to get back on. It’s a powerless feeling to be grasping into thin air, trying to grab onto that elusive spark that will reignite our passion and drive. For nearly a year now, I've found myself sidelined creatively, wrestling with a persistent creative block that seems insurmountable. The only thing worse than the lingering frustration is the complete inertia. I. Am. Stuck.

My mind, a spinning carousel of ideas and aspirations, seems to only exacerbate the problem. So many projects linger half-finished, abandoned in the wake of my wavering motivation. The weight of unfulfilled potential bears down on me, suffocating any semblance of progress. In the midst of this chaos, it's easy to feel overwhelmed (so overwhelmed!), to succumb to the paralysis of indecision. I keep remembering that COVID-era article that was circulating about ‘languishing’ and wondering, “am I the only one still in the stage of languish??”

Yet, in the silence of introspection, I've begun to discern a faint glimmer of hope – a realization that the key to unlocking my creativity lies not in external validation or fleeting inspiration, but in embracing the vast expanse of my inner world. It’s also about choices (yes, it’s tiring to make choices, but it’s necessary).

Lately, I’m starting to see that pushing myself past that super uncomfortable inertia to JUST TRY almost always yields the result I’ve been craving. It’s not ‘fake it ‘til you make it’. It’s consciously noticing when I choose to scroll on my phone or organize my desk instead of doing something that I know will unlock me creatively. That noticing is painful and confusing but I think it’s helping.

I desperately want to click that camera shutter more often, to reclaim those pieces of myself. I want to breathe life into forgotten ephemera, weaving together fragments of memory and imagination. Keeping the memories only inside my own head is where I’m feeling trapped. I want to weave a timeless tapestry of human experience that is tangible and leave-behind-able.

I’m still in the rut, don’t get me wrong. Writing this piece is a step towards climbing out. The postcard I wrote last night is another step. The gallery wall I redid on the weekend was another. The call I had with a creative friend today yet another. I’m getting there. Wherever there is. Which is perhaps the perfect way to end this piece – still struggling a little on the sidelines, but firmly using my indicator to signal my intention to get back on that racetrack.

Stuck in the middle with me: dispatches from a very deep creative rut