Part of your new identity as artist is integrity. It starts with being honest to yourself. And yes, sometimes that can be scary. When being honest to yourself, you have to admit that you are joining your friends into town for shopping, even if you actually would like to look for a quiet place to sit in the sun.
Usually I’d try to hide the urge for a quiet place, hide it even for myself, and go with my friends, wondering why I can’t enjoy it as much as they seem to do. And I still don’t know if they really enjoy it, or would love to join me for that quiet place in the sun …
An important part of unblocking your creativity in The Artist’s Way of Julia Cameron are the Morning Pages. You start to write for about 20 minutes every morning, first thing when you get up. This will help you to outwit your inner critic and will help you to find out more about your true feelings and needs. Every morning you will start to be honest to yourself. And if you want it or not, it will help you to raise your consciousness.
When being creative, you need that growing consciousness. Art is not based on fantasy, it’s based on observation of reality and the imagination how it could be different. For that, you need to be more and more conscious about yourself, your life, your dreams and about everything that is happening around you.
“The Music is always political because the truth is always political.” (Joseph Shabalala, Ladysmith Black Mambaso)
As artist, you can’t afford to distinguish between you, your ideals, your life and your art. That’s why integrity and consciousness is so important.
You might want to use your gained sense of safety, identity and power to move on with integrity.