Story Time: Rosemary & Theo
Tulip keeping me company while I performed a ritual for a client. (A tablecloth printed with blue, yellow and red flowers laid with three Tarot cards, a rose quartz, 2 black tourmalines, and a lit small candle)
I’m circling us back to the theme of overcoming creative fear to tell you the story of a client of mine who did exactly that. It’s an inspiring tale, I hope you enjoy.
Rosemary (name changed) came to work with me last September. She had just removed herself from an extractive freelance gig site, was running her own business, and had started working as a server again. She was battling burnout, not for the first time.
Central themes of the moment were agency, resources, and self expression. “I want to know when to rest, when to create, and when to work. I want to create balance in my life,” Rosemary told me.
We made a plan for what she needed:
Energetic boundaries with coworkers and her own clients - i.e., no more putting up with bullshit she didn’t agree with
Clarity around why none of her various types of work felt like balance
Ideas for how she could embody the energy of the source of all her inspiration: the Earth, food, and biomimicry.
Creating these things sounds like a tall order, but my work is all about tall orders, and breaking them into steps that can be completed with specific tools.
Rosemary is a very creative person. Once when we got on a call, I asked her, “How’s your day going?” and she told me, “Well I’m having a little love affair with this piece of dark chocolate in my mouth.” Her gifts for language, nourishment, and pleasure pour out of her. But she was struggling with how to create an environment for her creativity to thrive while trying to make a living.
We started, as I do with all my clients, with Parts Work: I asked Rosemary what anxious voices were loudest in her head, and what they were saying. Pretty immediately, we met Theo.
Theo appeared (in Rosemary’s mind) as a floating bald head wearing a cape, doing twirls. Their inherent absurdity and playfulness (the lack of body, the twirling) immediately delighted me - and Rosemary, too. Still, Theo was struggling. Some of their biggest messages for Rosemary were:
“Stay inside the box of normalcy!”
“It’s a lot of work to be an oustider, it’s easier to just be mainstream.”
“I feel like a freak, and I don’t wish that upon you. It’s a burden.”
They feared that Rosemary would end up alone, and, having experienced loneliness, didn’t want that for her. They were working hard to protect Rosemary from what they feared most.
In one of our sessions, I asked Rosemary to ask Theo what they dreamed of for her.
“I want you to show yourself,” they told her. “I want you to own your freaky frequency a little more each day. Stop investing in places you’ll need to hide yourself, and do what you really want.”
Over the following weeks, Rosemary said “No” to clients with unreasonable expectations, and found her nervous system more regulated due to the energetic boundaries she’d put in place. (My role in this is to give suggestions and be there for support when follow through is hard. I have a messaging app I use with all my clients.)
I asked her what part of her wanted to come out, now that those baselines were established. “My theatric self. My inner joker, poet, maybe even musician,” she said. I could feel her clarity, her readiness to emerge.
She was nervous about it: her sense of humor, the way she would randomly burst out into a skit or song that left her and friends all cracking up, had been for a small, safe group. She was considering sharing it with a broader audience.
Other Parts expressed their fear and told her to play it safe, and Rosemary cared for them. But Theo had learned to be a cheerleader, to encourage her to take risks in service of the life she longed for.
Upon hearing those other Parts’ fears, they said, “If you’re really ready to fly your freak flag high (as you claim), this feels like the perfect time to prove it.”
Theo became an advisor to Rosemary’s creative choices. They wanted to have her back in living her biggest life. She started asking them for advice on her business (“Start showing up for your marketing again! You’ve been doing so much but how will anyone know about it if you’re not sharing it?”) and her creativity (“Make weird freaky art!”).
Rosemary started to express herself more, through her jovial sense of humor (with anybody), bits and skits and songs shared spontaneously with loved ones, and Instagram. She bravely decided to use Instagram however she wanted to, regardless of its intended corporate purposes. (Rosemary’s clarity and Theo’s joyfulness in using the platform inspired me to get back on Instagram to share my own jokes, little videos, and general vibe with the world in a way that felt good to me.)
In our 4 months together, I watched Rosemary go from feeling captive to her anxieties and struggles to boldly expressing herself in her work, relationships, and art.
“Sharing that part of me with the world is the bravest thing that I can possibly think of. Because it's also the most authentic part of me," Rosemary told me.
The waxing gibbous moon out in the clear North Carolina evening sky last week
Want a taste of what Rosemary experienced?
Events & Offerings
Decolonizing Creativity
A workshop in collaboration with artist Karen Tarkulich
May 7 6:30 PM, People’s Solidarity Hub (white building)
Registration link forthcoming
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