Pleasing to My Heart, Freedom for My Kin
We already have so much stuff that pleases the masses. Music, movies, sports. What we don’t have is your heartistry expressed in a way that reflects your essential nature — what matters to you, what is pleasing to you.
I say that not knowing you and yet every single human being that puts out something that is theirs that is pleasing to them adds to Consciousness… adds to freedom.
I have a friend who wrote their memoirs for themselves, not to be published. It sits happily, merrily on a shelf now. A part of me absolutely loves that. That we can spend months crafting a book for just… ourselves.
I write these stories for thriving and I don’t share all of them. Some of them are just for the experience of expressing words and energy and my own moment in now.
And some I do share. I share the ones that are pleasing to share.
Why? Because I know that there’s a vibe, a vibration, a freedom that I want to encourage in the world. I want to encourage more creative expression so that I feel it more vividly. I want to encourage it for my children, for my family, for my kin… especially the Freedom Kin.
When you do something that is pleasing to you, and you do it in a way that the experience contributes to your thriving, your meaningfulness, we decouple from heavy anchors.
We decouple from the notion, the silly notion, that the things that matter the most are those that get mass adoption: millions of likes and shares. When we decouple from this ridiculous notion, we free our neighbors and ourselves.
The truth of the matter is that there are people who just “understand” and serve The Masses. And they love creating for the mid part of the bell curve, for the qualities that many millions and even a billion people find appealing.
But that’s such a small sliver of humanity that are geared that way… towards mass appeal.
My daughter is sitting with her headphones on… singing HER song HER way. I’m not recording that to put it out on YouTube. It’s pleasing to my heart in such an intimate and personal way. Her song matters to me.
When I use AI to create a song that reflects an experience that I just had with my family, if there’s a few lines in that that kind of tickle my fancy, like, “Oh yeah, that captures it,” I don’t always need to “publish” that. And neither do you.
We elevated those that are “New York Times bestselling authors” or Emmy Award winning. Give me a fucking break. As if that is anything other than status signaling.
Perhaps I’m being too harsh here. But sometimes, when something has become so culturally entrenched, this idea that status is conferred by best-selling lists and academic institutions and “best of the year awards” …we really need a certain intensity to recalibrate and free ourselves.
Because truly, we’ve gotten away from heartistry when we celebrate only those that are narrowly acceptable and celebrated by the masses.
A thriving life, one flush with abundant opportunities, is going to be co-creative. And creative freedom often is sourced from deep within. It sounds like, “I want to do this. I yearn to create this.”
The cool thing is if you’re doing it “to please and express yourself” (and maybe at times to share it with a few of your kin), guess what? You’re freed of that primitive terrifying fear that so many people have of being visible, of sending out your work into the world. “The World” isn’t going to like it. That’s right. The World is not going to like it!
I’m not aware of any artist that everyone likes. Which means that if you’re an artist that is exposed to a billion people, you’re going to get an awful lot of negative criticism.
I accept that some rare people have a nervous system that is wired to not give a fuck about that harsh criticism. Great. I’m not like that.
I’m not terrified of criticism. I know that my heartistry is not, absolutely not, never will be, not intended to be… “right” for everyone. It may not even be right for you.
If you’re somebody that really feels the call of your soul to reach millions of people with your message and to filter and winnow out of billions of people to find your 100 million, great. Go for it, Taylor. I’m not your coach. You probably wouldn’t even like me as a friend.
Because I’m going to be modeling a different way of thriving: savoring the simple uplift of creating a song that my family dances to that makes my mother smile.
The art that I do is fitting for the stories I write and for the workshops that I hold. And I truly and utterly want you to have the same freedom.
There was a boy in 7th grade art class I intimately remember. He was such an earnest student. Math, science, English, across the board… gifted with those academic subjects. But here he was in art class, and he was supposed to create a picture of flowers.
He was sitting at a table with people that were actually gifted at drawing. I mean, they were good. He was good at “his things” and they were good at theirs, so there wasn’t any jealousy. He just aspired to be able to express what he wanted to express.
But the purple colors and the lines and curves and things that he drew were pretty solidly imperfect, which he was actually okay with… right up until the point where the teacher came and criticized.
Now, critique is different than criticize. Criticize is to point out how defective it is, that it is not worthy, that there’s nothing really here that is likable or enjoyable. And that may have absolutely been true for someone who had gone to art school and had ended up as a seventh grade art teacher.
But at the time, what he felt was the pain of being pointed at and compared to. And it made him feel that there was nothing worthy about him taking color to paper.
For many years his (my 7th grade inner child’s) trauma from that experience kept me from creating visual art.
If that type of thing ever happened to you and you find yourself hesitant to put color to paper or words into form or sing that song, try doing it JUST for yourself. Wing it! Cry and laugh and splutter and croak it out.
Let the inner critic and the one who’s trying to protect you from being embarrassed or ashamed of how “not mass market, not best-selling” your heartistry is… just remind that part of you:
“It’s okay. We’re not doing it for ‘them.’ This is something that matters… to me. And that’s MORE than good enough. This is worthy of my time, energy, attention… and my love.”
Here’s to Heartistic Freedom!
Useful Concepts for Thriving in This Story
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Heartistry
Expressing into the world what matters to you. -
Imperfectionism
Letting go of perfection so making and sharing become possible. -
Emotional Freedom
Allowing the full range of feelings while choosing what supports you. -
Kinship
The felt closeness that grows when creation is shared with our people. -
Simple Uplifts
Small, sustainable joys that reliably brighten our state of being.