I recently came back from teaching at the Desert Nights Rising Stars conference at ASU. There, I was able to be both student and teacher. Reader and audience. Meals were spent discussing philosophy and workshopping ideas. It was a beautiful and creatively nourishing time.
The experience made me want to revist the concept of devotion in creative work and creative living.
I was once told that devotion is more important than focus or goal setting because devotion is something we can practice every day, through the highs and lows.
Creative devotion mirrors our beliefs and subsequent actions. The beliefs are tied to what we believe about the work we are creating. Are we doing it to check a box? To impress someone? To communicate something too complex for most conversations? To better understand ourselves? I could keep going, but the fact is what we believe influences our actions.
Discouragement comes in myriad forms. It’s not just being told that you need a prefab audience. It can be having bad communication from a publisher or partnering bookstore. It can mean reaching fewer people than we wanted (at least initially).
Some writers take hits because we feel we should be creating more, others wonder if writing even matters in a time of automation and acceptable plagiarism. Still other writers and artists believe they don’t have time to create and release what they take in.
“On the one side were techno-optimists who foresaw a utopian future. AI would eliminate workplace drudgery, diagnose diseases more effectively than doctors could, and save humanity from one of its most loathed burdens: paying writers for anything, ever.” —Brian Phillips
Whatever the source of our discouragement, we must believe in ourselves and our messages to practice creative devotion. When we start putting pressure on ourselves (or feel external pressure) to meet unrealistic timelines or compete with others (or hit x # of followers), it seems the work responds with rebellion.
“As any classically trained singer or actor can tell you, trying to make your voice sound like someone else’s can do all manner of damage to it.”
—Lauren Elkin
So here we are.
Individually, we can’t change larger trends or industry standards, and many don’t have the luxury to create more time, but we can change our mindset about the whole deal. Easy to say, I know. But this is why fostering creative devotion is the order of the day.
We should all acknowledge that we live in a time that pressurizes artists and tries to diminish contributions by replicating them en masse. Got it, got it! but! Here’s my message to counter such perspectives. If you hit a wall, try these reframes:
The lack of creative intellectual property (IP) or the prevalence of AI can force us to adopt the “write for myself” mindset.
Lack of time might add momentum if it is not forced.
Thinking we should be creating more might mean we believe we have more to give.
There is only one of us, and the only true way of wasting time is by trying to be like someone else.
And if the reframes aren’t enough for you, here’s a firm pep talk I used in my confidence post.
Stop wasting time trying to become what and who you already are.
You are where you need to be. You are creating what you are supposed to be creating, and you are creating it at the perfect pace and in a way that will allow the result to find its ideal timeline and audience—be that small or large, be that what you think will meet your current expectations or not. Despite what you sometimes think, you are on the right track, and it matters, and it matters in the way it should. Share your messages in the way you are sharing them, not from a place of pressure or guilt or fear or competition or even urgency. Share what you are called to share and nothing more.
Again, stop wasting time trying to become what and who you already are.
This is a bit of self-talk, but I thought I’d share it here with the intuition that it might resonate with a few of you. Yes, our voices matter, but perhaps the more important message is that we will say exactly what we need to say and release what we observe in our own time. We must remember not to get in our own way or psyche ourselves out.
Prompt: Explore the possibility of being radically you today. Journal accordingly.
Hey, hey, buy links for RADICALS are here. I promise you won’t regret it. Buy copies for friends and family and co-workers.
Nice words below:
“Radicals by Jen Knox has the bones of a period drama and the pulse of a small-town story: in the 1870s, a woman reaches for the presidency; more than a century later, another woman tries to make her hometown listen.” —Leah Tran
“Radicals is a book I’d give to a friend who likes a story with a real heart beating underneath it. Jen Knox's story follows Victoria C. Woodhull from a childhood marked by hardship into an adult life full of reinvention, while Avery, a young woman in 2026 Ohio, tries to find her footing at home. The two timelines give the book a clear, easy-to-follow shape, and the personal struggles make the history feel close rather than distant.” —Samantha Olsen
Thank you for reframing the word "devotion" to describe the creative practice. This is the perfect word for me to ponder today and moving forward.