Creativity for the sake of creativity

Thinking about the eternal artist's dilemma

Oil painting by Paul Hedley

My grandpa is a writer with admittedly very few readers. Each and every sentence he writes is multilayered and complex to read at first glance- but if you’re patient, it rewards you with unexpected humor and some real wisdom about life. He has published around 13 books in the past few years, and at his old age, writing is how he spends almost all his free time. When I visit, he often gives me a little spiral draft of his latest story, to take with me and read.

That’s usually the moment when my grandma, who couldn’t be more of his polar opposite (where he is quiet, introverted and mysterious, she’s very talkative, as extroverted as it gets, and extremely cute in every way), will turn to me and whisper something like “good luck!” and giggle to herself. She of course doesn’t mean badly; but the way my family regards my grandpa’s writing always seems to be something along the lines of “no one can read this, it’s too difficult, let’s just let grandpa do his thing”.

I personally love his writing. When I first gave it a chance after many failed attempts where my attention faltered three pages in, I was surprised by the thoughts that were hidden within his stories, and caught off guard by the depth of his personality that could only be shown through such masterful writing.

My grandpa’s books are published even though he makes virtually no money from them - especially in a small market such as Greece, gaining traction around books that haven’t blown up in some way is extremely difficult. I don’t know if he has more than a dozen readers; and yet, this doesn’t seem to be of any concern to him at all. He writes his books, he sends them over to publishers, they (sometimes) get published, and then he immediately gets started on the next one. His creativity, his craft, is something he does just because he likes it. He doesn’t write to be read; and when someone does read his work it’s just a welcome consequence. This is the point of what I’m writing about today: creativity for the sake of creativity.

Growing up in a largely digital world, my generation tends to struggle with the fine line between what you do privately and what you put out on the internet. You can easily say you’re a writer or painter when your social media accounts clearly reflect that, when you work is publicised in a way, and visible in your online persona. For example: I write almost every single day, just for myself. I love writing and have loved it since I learned to write. I write poetry, prose, essays, whatever I feel like, and it’s one of my biggest passions. However, calling myself a writer when I’m someone that has almost never published anything she writes, doesn’t always feel quite right to me, as someone brought up in this social media landscape.

Being creative just for the sake of it, not as a means to have some type of creative work to publish, can have incredible benefits: you get into a flow state, you discover hobbies that fulfil you, you nourish your brain. But the digital economy as it is, has put some weight onto publicising what you do, otherwise imposter syndrome and/or the voice of the internet masses in your head, might come knocking, to ask “how can you say you’re an artist when no one knows you are?”. But that’s why I’m writing this today. If we use the example of a painter, it’s easier to see: what is a painter? I lean towards defining it as “someone who paints regularly” rather than “someone who paints publicly”. Social media has made us feel as if the second definition is the correct one, when that doesn’t actually make much sense. What differentiates someone who paints every day in private, and someone who paints every day and posts about it on Instagram? Nothing besides the act of practicing their craft in public- and that’s not what makes someone a painter.

It’s an unfortunate consequence of social media, in my opinion, that we feel like if we’re not constantly sharing our work in a certain field, we can’t comfortably associate ourselves with that label. Sharing your work can be life-changing (I’m a big fan of Austin Kleon’s Show Your Work, which is all about that); but being creative just for the sake of it can be life-changing as well, especially when you dissociate yourself from that pressure. When you’re being creative just for yourself, for creativity’s sake, you remove the third actor in the equation (you + your creative work + public), and in many cases that can allow you to explore a craft more deeply, show more of yourself in your work, and eliminate the external pressure of someone else’s interpretation. You can create art that is more real, because when you’re doing it just for yourself, that’s all that matters. This is how I feel my grandpa looks at his writing, even though he publishes it; the lack of focus on whether he gets any readers keeps him true to himself instead of trying to mould his creativity into what would sell more copies. He’s creating something that he loves, not something that he feels would get the most external approval.

I genuinely believe that practicing being creative in this way can lead to more fulfilling everyday lives. Next time you feel that external pressure that social media has drilled into most of our heads, just don’t give it any weight and keep going. If you paint every day and you love doing that, you’re a painter; if you write songs all the time and play music, you’re a musician… You’re allowed to be defined by your passions without having to put them out there if you don’t want to.

Thank you for reading! ✨

— Erifili

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