The World Is Made Up. Create Anyway.
On fear, agency, and shaping the world we live in.
Every single aspect of our daily lives was made out of thin air. The words we speak. The rules we live by. The jobs we do. The art we’re moved by. The clothes we wear. The value we exchange. All once did not exist until someone, one day, decided it should. And they simply made it up.
Is what they created the best method, the best design, the smoothest function? In some cases, yes. In others, not quite. It’s why as a society we are constantly evolving. We learn more, we change. Or we learn more, and we try to get other people to change. Or we deny new learnings as a way to deny change. Its a complicated system you only have to turn on your tv to remember.
I have been thinking a lot about how it is all made up. And in realizing that, I’ve started to rethink my place in the world. What do I really believe in? What do I want more of in my life? What do I disagree with, and what would I like to see changed?
The core of it, once my eyes were opened to this constructed world, I felt a new sense of empowerment. If so much came from nothing, I can create from nothing too. Expect my “nothing” is actually something. I am a human with lived experience, with perspective, with a lens only I can see through.
And it’s through that lens that we create art.
I spent most of my life believing that creativity was reserved for artists. I once wanted to design clothes, but quickly talked myself off that ledge when I realized there were people way more talented and better suited for the job. And that’s where the self-doubt began.
Creativity is not reserved for artists. It’s a biological impulse. A tool we use to shape experience into meaning. A tool in which we can make our mark and bring something into the world that wasn’t there before.
Creation moves life forward. Not just through survival, but through expression. It’s not about recognition or output. It’s about reconnecting to aliveness. It reveals what you notice, what you care about, what you’re drawn to. And in that process, you become more yourself.
And in becoming more yourself, you find connection. To yourself. To other people. To community. To love, both inward and outward.
Maybe this feeling doesn’t concern everyone. But for me, it’s become an undeniable truth in my search for meaning and happiness.
I have a dear friend who works in finance. She loves music and art, but her career, where she spends most of her days, is behind a desk looking at numbers.
On a recent trip together, she opened up about her love of art. Her grandfather was a painter and she was curious if she had the skill in her too. She suspects she did. But trying would be intimidating. Trying means risking failure.
Fear isn’t comfortable. We’re wired to interpret it as danger. Safety feels like survival.
But the conscious truth? Being bad at art will not kill you. Avoiding risk so completely that you never grow into your potential might actually do more damage.
I’ve written before about viewing creativity as resistance. Art influences culture. It shapes society. It can bring things to light in ways a speech cannot. But beyond societal change, there’s a quieter shift that happens within us.
Sometimes we sense something is missing. Something is slightly off. We can’t always articulate it, but we can feel it.
A creative practice can surface what logic cannot. It can help you understand what you like, what you care about, what you are drawn toward, and where purpose might live for you.
Perhaps you’re doing just fine without art. If so, you’re likely not reading this. But if you’re feeling less than fine, I encourage you to create in whatever medium feels natural or fun.
Not to share with anyone, unless you want to. Not to prove anything. Not for a profit.
Create as a way to reconnect with yourself. To express your unique experience. To build confidence and solidify the teaching that you have the ability to fail, improve, fail again, and improve more.
Creation does not need to be perfect. It simply needs to exist.
So if it’s fear you’re feeling, create anyway. For your own good, and perhaps, for the good of this world.
Thank you for being here,
Kelly