Consume vs. Create
“Who is this person?” I thought. Fifteen minutes had flown by, my thumb was pulsating as my soul was shrinking into Facebook oblivion. I caught myself in a moment of lightening awareness, with the thunderous rumble of creation roaring through my veins.
“What am I even doing?”
I’d spent the past fifteen minutes scrolling, sensing, feeling, consuming messages of hope, despair, light, darkness, facts, conspiracy, quotes, and images of lunch and COVID tests. What I’d accomplished...nothing. What I’d felt...everything.
It’s easy to get enthralled into the black hole of consuming on social media. It gives our brains the dopamine rushes like a heroin addict as our thumbs repetitively shove the scrolling into our eyeballs, heightening our senses while simultaneously numbing them.
I put the phone down on the table and walked outside for a breath of fresh air.
Even as high performers, it’s easy to get lost in the addiction to consume - Netflix, alcohol, mindless scrolling on social media, sugar. The list goes on and on of the cavities of excuses that we use to justify.
What I’ve seen, especially with high performers, is that sometimes, they think it’s almost justifiable. More often…
They’ve made enough money to be comfortable…
Worked on enough projects to feel like you “deserve” it…
Dealt with enough customer issues, team issues, baby issues to logically draw the conclusion that escape is necessary.
“I just need to turn my brain off.”
One of my clients even admitted to falling asleep with her phone in hand after spending hours in the dark of the night scrolling as she told herself lies that what she was consuming was “keeping her up to date” with the world. She hadn’t slept well in a month.
EXCUSES. EXCUSES.
My question though is this…
To WHAT feeling do you need to turn your brain off to?
APATHY? FEAR? FRUSTRATION? ANGER? PRIDE?
When I caught myself mindlessly scrolling today, it was the same feeling that I’d caught myself years and years ago mindlessly eating.
Except now, I recognize the feelings that trigger the response.
I could easily give you the five tips or twelve steps, or whatever amount of steps you need to stop mindlessly consuming.
But no tip or trick or any amount of steps will help you shift from consumer to creator unless you look at the underlying EMOTION that you are trying to suppress, repress, or escape from.
It is through the lower vibrations of emotions that we tend, more often than not, to consume.
The virus of consumption coughs up bloody bits of unwanted, undesired states - apathy, anger, sadness, fear, shame, guilt, pride.
What EMOTION are you running from?
IT IS THROUGH COURAGE THAT WE CREATE.
It is with COURAGE that we design, build, dream...and now, this world needs your creativity.
It needs you to put forth a great, fearless, wave of creativity to bring forth innovation and new solutions.
You don’t have to scroll through social media to see that people have a lot of problems right now.
It is your job as a business leader, as a visionary, as a creator to connect and bring forth new answers, new opportunities, new learnings to change and challenge the apathy of the world.
THIS WORLD NEEDS YOU TO STAND OUT, TO BEAT YOUR DRUM OF RE-WIRING, RECODING, AND REPROGRAMMING THE EMOTIONS OF YOUR MIND TO FACE THE TRUE NORTH OF COURAGE.
I’m not saying it’s easy. And I’m not saying that you won’t have moments, like me standing at my dining room table, where you catch yourself escaping into the bog of other aimless complaining and commiserating, instead of designing with intention a solution for humanity.
But let it be a moment.
You are self-aware enough to be able to catch yourself and make a NEW choice.
DECIDE again.
COMMIT again.
And, forget beating yourself up for how you spent the last fifteen minutes. For that still serves no one, especially not you, and especially not the gifts - your gifts - which you MUST unleash unto the world.
It is your job to dig deep, to decide, to unearth the ugly feelings that you try to hide from in the name of “positive thinking” and allow for YOU, all of you to come forth into this world.
For that is how REAL solutions are created. Using all parts - the light and the dark - to shine your light, your creation, your vision out into the world.
We are the visionaries, the leaders, the rabble-rousers, the ones who are unafraid to rock the boat, for we know that when we shake up our business, our industries, our world…
A new earth is to be birthed.
All creation has its side effects of labor pains. Instead of injecting them with an epidural, face the labor pains and push forth your GENIUS into the world.
The time is now to create as you’ve never created before in your life.
This world needs you to stand out and breathe the fresh air of a new perspective, for new solutions, new opportunities, new life is on the other side.
Remember, your reign is now.
P.S. I am honored to be appearing in Shaunay Cotton’s The Transformed Creative Show, for creatives, musicians, actors, writers, and creative geniuses who are looking to create more abundance. I drop some MASSIVE collab bombs on how to make money as a freelance artist during these trying times. So if you know a friend who is a musician or artist, please forward this to them as well.
Oh, and as a special bonus, my hubby is in the show too!