The Creative Instinct

It’s obvious isn’t it? You can’t live well with a malnourished soul.

Yeah?

So how come we forget to nourish it so often?

‘m not just talking about creativity here. Of course it’s important to do you own creative thing the way you really want to and need to. But I’m talking about other soul nourishment too: being in the sunshine or the snow, being on the water or in the mountains, surrounding yourself with the people that make you buzz, or being on a bike, or kicking, throwing and chasing a ball simply because that’s what your body needs to do.

This topic came up talking with friend, coach and writer Jeni Mumford the other day. She’d been so busy with other projects that her writing had taken a back seat for a while. Only when she got back to it did she remember how much it gave her.

‘Andy,’ she said, ‘why the heck do we stop doing the things that we know feed our soul and are good for us?’

I thought about it later, and I guess there are a lot of reasons:

• We get too busy
• Because we are busy, it often takes a conscious effort to squeeze in the soul nourishment between all the soul starvation stuff we have to do
• We get sidetracked by easy distractions like TV and alcohol
• We feel too grown up to do what can seem like childish things
• We can’t get anyone to join in

And on top of it all, we simply forget.

I’ll confess that the soul nourishment I miss most just now seems quite childish: throwing and catching balls and Frisbees, kicking footballs, jumping and chasing in a generally joyful manner. Put me near a Frisbee and someone who looks half willing and I’m like a dog with a stick - c’mon, c’mon, play with me - throw the bloody stick.

To be fair, I’m 53 years old and get my soul nourished pretty well in other ways, but I still hanker after this. And it seems pretty crazy that I only properly admitted it to myself over the last couple of months. I almost feel sorry for my grandkids when they’re old enough. People will remark how patient I am, playing with them for so long - and I’ll smile and tell the grandkids that yes, of course we can stop… soon.

But does it matter if I don’t get my fix of this particular kind of soul nourishment? I think it does. For a start, it would easily be my preferred form of exercise - but it’s also important to the way I relax and the way I feel about myself. And I think it has an impact too on my focus when I’m doing the jobs that don’t nourish my soul, but are nevertheless worth doing.

I need to figure this one out.

In the meantime, what’s the nourishment that your soul is missing out on right now?

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