Why I Create

Source: pinterest/huffingtonpost

"Why one writes is a question I can never answer easily, having so often asked it of myself. I believe one writes because one has to create a world in which one can live. I could not live in any of the worlds offered to me – the world of my parents, the world of war, the world of politics. I had to create a world of my own, like a climate, a country, an atmosphere in which I could breathe, reign, and recreate myself when destroyed by living. That, I believe, is the reason for every work of art." - Anais Nin

There has been no writing I have connected to as much as I have with Anais Nin's words. The way she uses art to let out repressed feelings and emotions is something I can draw parallels with every day. For me, writing is a very sacred art, a ritual, if you may. When I write, I forget my surroundings and the burden of the mundane that weighs me down. I let go off all inhibitions and let my soul take over - a dangerous yet rejuvenating exercising, that. For those few hours I create, I am no wife, no mother, no woman, no daughter. For those hours, I carefully untie all labels off my body, my vagina and my life, and I carelessly place them in a box called "junk." In the process of creating something appealing to the reader and to myself (the latter in marginal proportions), I become the person I admire and look up to. I become everything I am in the making, everything I have not yet become - then, I am the radical feminist. I am the published author. I am a poet. I am an inspiration.
I create, because there is nothing more cathartic than fine tuning my mind and soul, placing them in congruence.
All those who create art do it for reasons varied and myriad. For some, it is soul food - it is what heals them of all hurt, ego and emotional insecurity. It is what gives meaning to, and edifies their creative journey. For others, it could be in using their hands to create something tangible; it could be to stimulate the viewer or reader. Art is created because artists cannot separate life from work. It is like the little streams that eventually join into rivers and vast oceans - one flows into the other, creating a bigger picture. And art, for the artist, is the bigger picture. For Picasso it meant "washing the dust of daily lives off our soul" and for Joan Didion, it meant finding answers.
Why I create has a rather obvious answer - it is calming. It helps me express all those feelings otherwise held back tight within the self. Why I create is not a question you'd ask every day. Instead, it is a question I ask myself every day. And my answer to that question is what reassures me to continue creating, through storm and peace.