Regardless of what kind of artist you are, you’ll probably find yourself retracing the same steps and addressing the same topics. If you’re not careful, this can lead you to believe you are less than creative. Don’t go there.
It’s far more likely that your life has a theme, a subject or a passion or even a favorite element that you find yourself revisiting again and again because you love it so much or because it means so much to you.
For a time, it bothered me that I kept writing about the same subjects: beginning, creating for the joy of it, permitting one’s self to be less than perfect. I was beginning to think I was a dullard and a hack.
But alas, these are the things I care about. These are the things seated somewhere near my core. I know how hard it can be to begin. I know how easy it can be to dismiss your longing to make things, especially things that not everyone values as much as you do. And I know how much fear you have to overcome in order to take on the dragon of perfectionism. So I write about it.
I not only want to knock down these obstacles in my own life. I also want to help others do the same, so I keep trying to find new ways to say the same things.
If you’re a chef, you might find yourself repeatedly working with a set of favorite ingredients or a particular kind of dish like a soup or a salad or a casserole. This is not a problem; it’s an opportunity, because in the end you’ll discover new and exciting ways, ways others have not thought of, to use those ingredients or prepare those dishes.
If you’re a visual artist, don’t be surprised if you’re drawn again and again to the same subjects, be they skyscrapers or rose petals or the bones of fish. There’s beauty in everything, but it may be that you are especially equipped to find it in the items that repeatedly grab your own attention. This is good, because the rest of us may be in need of someone to show us just how beautiful those things really are.
And if you are a writer, regardless of whether you write poems, novels, stories, or songs, you will surely keep showing up at the door steps of themes that will, in time, become old friends. This too is good, because in addition to becoming a better writer you will become somewhat of an expert in the things that speak to you, which will enable you to speak to others about them, especially those who need to hear about them.
This year, I intend to repeat myself a great deal. Without shame, without apology, and, I hope, in new and exciting ways. I hope you’ll do the same.
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I agree completely!! And, because many of these topics that resonate so with you, do with me as well, I’ll probably be reading a lot of what you write. Also I’ll probably be doing a lot of head nodding and smiling having felt that wonderful sense of “AHA” connection.
So, Ken, I’m not the only creator guilty of repetition. And I thought it was just because I grew up on Saturday Morning Hanna-Barbera cartoons. As a cartoonist, I seem to keep drawing and writing the same gags and stories since 2006, maybe even before that. But I’m not worried–I think I keep getting better with each and every attempt. Viva redundance!