Without realizing, we can go through life in a defensive posture. We learn these behaviors at home and school, from bullies and bosses and anyone who tries to steamroll over us on the way to their goal or merely because they can.
I can be defensive about, quite literally, anything. I can still hear my dad complaining that I wore too many black clothes. I can hear my ex telling me I stacked the dishwasher incorrectly. I still hear religious sex shaming and the kids at school teasing about just about everything. I was a bookish, non-athletic, socially awkward, late to puberty but soon-to-be gay nerd on the autism spectrum, with stimming behaviors that in retrospect look a lot like mild Tourette’s, who was being raised by reclusive parents in a fringe religious sect.
Let’s say I gave the world a lot of material to work with.
I’m an adult now. All those people are long gone from my life. I drummed out the weird fidgety behavior before I went to college, thank goodness, decades before I got a diagnosis. Like Popeye, I accept that I am what I am.
But the voices don’t truly vanish, do they? They still pop up from time to time. Fortunately they are now mere nagging memories, not some ghost that can make me feel shame or alter my conduct. But they linger.
Of course, a lot of that shame and defensiveness spilled over into my creative life, staining my thoughts on how much I write and how often, the genres I like, my problematic characters, if self-publishing will make me look like a hobbyist, if my themes are sufficiently weighty and topical. If there’s an element of writing to consider, there’s a nag in my head telling me that the way I do it isn’t serious enough.
But really, who cares? Other than my own bad thoughts, who out there is waiting to pounce on my creative work? Everyone self-publishes these days. I can write family drama or superhero stories. Everyone is problematic if you scratch far enough beneath the surface. It’s ok to create and have fun in the way I like.
My defensive postures served me in my youth, when I hadn’t any other options. There are only so many ways a kid can avoid family, church, and school, and these methods are painfully temporary. But I can see these patterns no longer serve me well, especially as I get older and the windows start to close. I don’t have to go through life in a crouch.
Starting now, I’m going to practice dropping my defensiveness about my creativity. I won’t assume I’m surrounded by barbarians.