Questions. Our path as creatives and as human beings are consistently lined with ’em. How early should I set the alarm for tomorrow? What will I eat for dinner? Will I take this job offer or continue in the career I’m currently in, or can I do both?
Some days we have clear answers, others more ambiguous. When it comes to our creativity, though, we can make decisions that will help mold our path so we can stay true to our calling while still making room for our multipassionate lives.
A few months ago, Haley Pettit showed how we can imbue intention in our journey. This month, Rose Ketring shares how we can carve out the path ahead.
The Creative: Rose Ketring
Rose Ketring is an artist who constantly seeks ways to blend the visual with the written. In addition to being a writer and a visual artist, she also incorporates her interests of coding, cooking, and speech pathology into her work cycles. In her words, she’s a teacher at heart and currently works as a substitute at the grade school level.
From the time I met her through Twitter (Yay, internet!), I’ve known her to be deeply engaged in her passions and to possess an eagerness in passing on what she learns along the way. In making our path through places where society may try to funnel us into particular grooves, here’s what we can learn from her experiences.
Find Your Lane
Translating well worn paths—going to school, finding a job, and retiring in that particular field—into our own multipassionate mixture of awesome, Rose encourages us to use strategies within strategies to encounter breakthrough.
For example, take NaNoWriMo and Willowing Arts’s Lifebook. Instead of simply participating in these events to build her works-in-progress, Rose connects with other creatives through forums, incorporates community-based games, and finds meditative states while creating art to take these passions outside of her head and into an immersive experience.
We can do the same in our creative lives. See past the face value of our creative practice, beyond the product and toward the inner effects that arise from these practices. Rose says, “Move through your process at your own speed, do not compare.” Allow yourself the opportunity to discover your process.
This could look like cycles of a few months (years?) focused on one aspect until you’re drawn to another. Perhaps this could look like a single passion, such as music, where you enter different phases, from dancing to playing in a band and perhaps later mixing both. Whatever your process, embrace the parts that come natural to you, to explore the places that are yet uncharted.
Follow Your Way
When you uncover your lane, continue to do the work that matters to you rather than simply passing the time. But Rose reminds us to “Take care of yourself.” When we’re not taken care of, doing the work becomes difficult.
Like Rose, early in life, we might’ve made certain choices to appease our parents, guardians, and / or authority figures. They’ve lived longer, they probably know what they’re doing. Right? Yet when we find our way, we find comfort in our own skin.
Let’s think in terms of traffic. Many Western countries have yellow and white markings on roads for vehicles to follow. They’re the law. However, some Eastern countries like the Philippines have the lines, yet vehicles don’t always drive within them. My dad likes to say, “They’re more like guidelines.” Emilie Wapnick calls our curiosity, the need to go from lane to lane, our superpower. So trust in your process, even if it means coloring outside the lines.
Live in such a way that adds value to society but not at the expense of your well-being—physically, mentally, spiritually. Give yourself the time and space to find the lane that suits your natural tendencies. Once you start to get into your groove, follow it like the yellow brick road lined with your monumental accomplishments and everyday wins.
Rose Ketring is an artist, writer, poet, and mental health advocate. Her work focuses on the power of connecting words and color to create new possibilities. She lives in Gambrills, Maryland, with her husband, two cats, and a bearded dragon.
I believe that creating art is not only for professionals. The process of creating, no matter the medium, is vital for self-care.
Find more of Rose’s visual art on Instagram and consider supporting her work through Patreon.
Let’s Chat
When you think of a creative who’s blazed their own path, who comes to mind? Let them know you see them and their valuable work by givin ’em a shoutout in the comments!
Update:
Hint of Jam’s newest course “Self Management & Organization for Scatterbrained Creatives” is open for enrollment! These lessons are for creatives working on making space for the important things in life. Starting in summer, lessons will be uploaded section by section with a live workshop to accompany ’em.
Sign up to join the first batch (Pssst! That means the course’ll be at no cost to you!) by clicking here or on the image below.
