Ep #179: How Judgment Inhibits Our Creative Genius

You have capacities within you that are phenomenal, if only you know how to release them, physicist, David Bohm. For me what lies at the heart of my work, whether it’s my work in creativity coaching, through The Art School, through this podcast or my own work as an artist and as a writer is a knowing that we do as humans have capacities within us that are phenomenal. And therefore, the question that lies at the heart of my work is how to release them. How do we tap into and release these phenomenal capacities?

I have talked about this as re-genius-ing in prior episodes, referencing Buckminster Fuller’s quote about how we are all born geniuses but the condition of living de-geniuses us. In today’s episode and then the next few coming episodes, this mini cluster collection of episodes I want to focus in particularly on how judgment prevents us from releasing these capacities.

And also, I want to continue last week’s conversation about how to ask questions that tap into your greatness, into your genius and how using questions can help you establish a dialogue, a practice of dialoging with your capital-C Creativity with all caps, that which wants to happen through you.

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You are listening to The Art School Podcast; a show for artists and creatives who want to become the next greatest version of themselves. Learn how to cultivate an extraordinary way of being and take the mystery out of making money, and the struggle out of making art. Here is your host, Leah Badertscher.

Hello everyone and welcome to another episode of The Art School Podcast. There has been so much happening and a lot of celebrations in The Art School and among the community of Art School alum. And I just wanted to take a few moments to share some of these with you. And it is for the pure joy of celebrating and it also is strategic because creativity thrives not in isolation but in community. And this is very germane to the topic of how does judgment inhibit our creative genius? And also, what we can do to become inhibited in expressing our creative genius?

One powerful way to disarm the kind of judgment, the inner critic that keeps our creativity, our genius, our fullest potential on lockdown is community, is a generative, supportive, creative community. And also, within this community, creativity and creative success are contagious. So just additional reasons why I wanted to share these celebrations here.

First of all, a big brava to Kirsten Feldberg Marion on the release of her young adult brilliant book, Lucy & Dee, The Silk Road. I started reading this with my own children over this last week, this spring break and we are in love. You have a feeling of Narnia and then also like my kids pointed out, you learn amazing things along the way. And it’s also just fresh new characters and a fresh voice all of its own, highly recommend. The story is so enticing and beautifully rendered, beautifully told. So, a huge congratulations to Kristen who is one of our Art School alum.

Another of our Art School alum I just received a stack of her books in the mail this last week, Allie Sumrall on Instagram @animalsthattalk. So, Allie has written, and illustrated, and published a charming beautiful little children’s book called The Little Acorn. And again, one that my kids read right away a few times as soon as it came and we also have ordered extras so that we can share this with family and friends, and their schools. So, I highly recommend you get a copy of your own for your own family or for the children in your life and children’s libraries.

I also want to give a shout out to Tracey, one of our capital-C Creative MDs, medical doctors. We always have this beautiful contingent of medical doctors in our community and Tracey has launched a beautiful incredible new chapter in her own career. So truly applying the principles of creating and defining your own life on your own term and running with it. So, congratulations to Tracey and also to Christian who has manifested a job in music, a new job that is paying him twice what the previous job was paying.

Also props to Hope Dunbar who recently celebrated the one year anniversary of her kickass album, Sweetheart Land. And is also performing in Paris as we speak. That whole story of how that came about is awesome, synchronous and wild, and maybe for another time. But also Hope has been on the podcast before. So, if you are interested in listening to that episode I definitely highly recommend that.

So, these are just a handful of celebrations, recent celebrations from Art School alum and also a shout out to a listener who shared that just by listening to the podcast she’s really moved the needle in her own creative practice in terms of making room for her art and her own creativity. So, thank you Blue for sharing the podcast on social media. That was great to see and I so appreciated your message.

So, in today’s episode I once again really want to encourage you to consider this capital-C Creativity not as just a way to fix a problem in your life, or fix something about yourself, or band-aid a solution but really capital-C Creativity as a way of life, as moving into a place of constant and deeper dialog with your highest self, with the highest source.

And with something, this phrase came to me years ago, a dialog with that which wants to happen through you. I held a retreat by that name, it was the first retreat I held several years ago and I am strongly considering holding more of those retreats again. I’d love to do more in-person work again. So, dialoging with your highest self with capital-C Creativity, that which wants to happen through you and your source.

This to me is the path for re-genius-ing, is this kind of deep presence and deep listening for a creativity that is alive, that is intelligent, is a self-organizing intelligence. And it wants to happen through you.

I mentioned presence, and speaking of that I came across this book entitled Presence, Human Purpose and the Field of the Future written by Peter Senge, C. Otto Scharmer, Joseph Jaworski, and Betty Sue Flowers. It is not a new book. I think it’s been around a couple of decades. Though just came into my orbit within the past few weeks. And I am struck and feel deeply affirmed. I will say that, I won’t go into great details or down any rabbit holes about the book right now, maybe in future episodes.

But suffice to say for now I am struck and feel again, deeply affirmed. Although they are playing it not strictly in an artistic context. Many of the principles and practices are very familiar to me and including things that I thought were very particular and adducing critic to me.

And what I wanted to share from that book on today’s episode is first this story where they reference a study done by Howard Gardner’s project, Zero at Harvard. And it involved developing intelligence tests for babies. The project also tested older subjects. And the researchers found that up to age four, almost all the children were at the genius level. In terms of the multiple frames of intelligence that Gardner talks about, spatial, kinesthetic, musical interpersonal, mathematical interpersonal and linguistic.

But by age 20 the percentage of children at genius level was down to 10%. And over age 20 the genius level proportion of the subjects sank to 2%. So, doesn’t this remind you of that Buckminster Fuller quote about how we are all born geniuses but the condition of loving de-geniuses us? It definitely reminds me of that. And then in the book they go on to say everyone asks, “Where did it go? Where did this genius go?”

And Michael Ray who is the creator of this Stanford Business School creativity course that was highly popular for years and years and informed so many great thinkers and innovators. He’s been called most creative man in Silicon Valley, that Michael Ray responded that the genius, it didn’t go anywhere. But it’s covered over by the voice of judgment. Now, he’s not talking about judgment, just to be clear, in terms of discernment, of being awake, and aware, and discerning, and being open to feedback in your environment.

He’s talking about the kind of judgment that doesn’t allow your creativity to move forth, that looks at you or others in the world and criticizes them and says, “This is bad”, or just aborts any sort of creativity before it has a chance to be fully fleshed out and emerge. And Ray goes on to say that what we’re trying to do is set up situations where people can attack the voice of judgment and access their deeper creativity.

Ray believes that we can consistently bring our creativity into our lives by paying attention to it and by building the capacity to suspend the judgments that arise in our mind such as that’s a stupid idea, you can’t do that. These judgments that limit creativity. So those two practices consistently bringing creativity into our lives by paying attention to it and also building the capacity to suspend judgments are two things that we focus on in The Art School. And I also will talk more in depth about how to do this yourself in upcoming episodes particularly focusing on judgment.

And I particularly want to talk about judgment and the central nervous system, judgment and neuroscience. What happens in our brains and in our bodies when we are experiencing this voice of judgment, this inner critic. And how that actually inhibits our ability to tap into sources of higher creativity and flow, and how we experience that in our bodies and what we can do about that.

I do think these are crucial critical practices for re-genius-ing, for renaturing, for returning to your true nature and being able to tap into that flow of creativity, be present with it, move beyond like a linear model of needing to see things just fall out, see your vision fall out tidily, neatly in a row. But instead, truly being in dialog which means not just forcing your will on what you think the thing should be, but practicing this deep presence-ing and deep listening to what wants to happen through you and realizing that it doesn’t necessarily and rarely happen in a linear cohesive fashion.

But there’s much more mystery and mystique to it. And the particular practices that you can employ in your own life to develop these practices of being able to suspend judgment. So, allowing that which wants to happen through you, to come through you. And then also how to pay attention, have a much deeper relationship and dialog with capital-C Creativity in your own life.

For now, though I really wanted to first introduce this study, tell you the story of this Project Zero study, introduce you to Michael Ray. Because two of his questions that were at the heart of the creativity courses that he taught at Stanford and his books I think are powerful questions that you can use to dialog with your highest self, your own capital-C Creativity, that which wants to happen through you.

We’ve talked a lot in this podcast about what it means to live and work from your zone of genius, to build a home in your zone of genius as Gay Hendricks writes in The Big Leap. And an idea that we’ve talked about too is how much human suffering and how many problems stem from living below our zone of genius. And why do we do that?

I think one of the reasons is because we are not taught or encouraged, or it’s taboo, it’s not mainstream, it’s sometimes laughable or uncomfortable to talk about dialoging with something greater than yourself. To talk about creativity as something that exists in a whole already fully patterned, fully designed and that you’re bringing it through. You are just being a channel for it.

As I’ve talked about in recent episodes too, we have lived in a society that worships the rational mind, which is supposed to be the servant and defiles the sacred intuition which is the gift. And so reintroducing traditions and the idea of intuition as being a sacred gift and a completely valid form of intelligence. And being so then that’s the nature of it whether you think of it as divinity, or an intelligence, or a life force with that knowing then wouldn’t you want to pay attention to it?

Wouldn’t you want to set aside your small self and instead tap into what might not even be your zone of genius but a genius that also then lights up and evokes that which in you, that you are built to be and built for in this lifetime? So, for anyone that might be new to the podcast or new to my work and could be coming from an orientation of, she’s a life coach. Therefore, she tells people how to fix their problems, how to live their life, that couldn’t be further from the truth.

What I am most passionate about is really having conversations and being in a presence, being in a relationship, creating containers for people that facilitate them knowing themselves and moving to a level of very deep knowing within themselves. So that they do know who they are because from that place I think then what comes naturally are these capacities within us that are phenomenal. And a knowing of how to release them. And asking yourself very powerful questions from an orientation where you are assuming the sacredness of your life.

You are assuming divinity, your connection to divinity is I think as important a part of the process as the actual questions themselves. But I do want to also share the questions themselves. So, the two questions that Michael Ray is known for. Who is myself? And what is my work? Who is myself? Two words. And what is my work?

So, this brings me to the part of the podcast where I want you to do more than just listen. I want you to lean in and really work with me, coach with me. And I also want to offer the additional instruction in this episode, that it’s really not so much leaning into me, working with me, so much as leaning into your deep self, your highest self and something greater than you. And working with that in your life. Asking yourself these questions. And again, taking the sacred orientation to it. Who is myself? And what is my work?

And I might add, these are questions that are questions for a dialog, an ongoing relationship, not just one and done. But something to engage with because you are a living entity and so is creativity, so is that which wants to happen through you. So, to be awake, and aware, and in presence with it, a moment by moment presence, not just a memory of who you thought you were, or an idea, or a will, or wish, or whim about who you hope to be. But in this moment truly being with yourself and with this greater force. Truly being in relationship with it and using these questions as a dialog.

Another thing that I like to add on to the end when I’m using this in my own meditation, asking who is myself and what is my work. And then I’ll offer myself the prompt, can you imagine everything else falling away and then what’s left? What’s left is what’s sacred and essential which is something, principles that I’ve talked about in prior podcasts. So, can you imagine everything else falling away, everything that is not you, that is not the self, that is not your work, that is not that greatness?

Another question that I love, that I alluded to at the beginning of this episode is, what question lies at the heart of your work? Just beginning to ask that question and take that question seriously and tapping into the answer does move you closer and closer to living from and creating from your zone of genius. I’ve shared that mine, one of my passions is this work of re-genius-ing, is this work of removing the voice of judgment and anything else that is covering up our innate potential, our innate creativity and letting that come through.

And for me too it is a belief that if something has chosen you, if you have a desire to write a book and it’s been with you, that already exists fully formed, whether it’s a book, a painting, a business, some other vision for your life. And then this work of cultivating a way of being that allows you to be the channel and the vessel, for that work coming to life, that work that will enhance and benefit your life and enhance and benefit the world. That for me lies at the heart of my work.

And there’s a little bit of a clue in that question too, the heart of your work. I’ll talk more about the centrality of the heart and my approach for creativity, and in other people’s, the way their philosophy and their methodology approaches it. But I just wanted to put that bug in your ear for now and remind you of that question. What question lies at the heart of your work?

Also, I would listen to this episode in conjunction with a past episode where I’m asking you to dialog with your greatness. And encourage you to do this not as a one and done but as a way of life, as creativity, capital-C Creativity really truly being a way of life.

Thank you for listening to another episode of The Art School Mastermind. If you know you have capacities within you that are truly phenomenal, if you have a creative vision, a creative dream that wants to happen through you and you’re asking yourself, if only I knew how to release them. Then you will want to apply for The Art School Mastermind. Because whatever it is that you’re thinking of doing in The Art School Mastermind it’s going to happen. That’s how high the energy, that’s how powerful the coaching, that’s how next level this community is.

This experience will be pure and simple. You doing your best work ever, the best work of your life and being more fulfilled, happier, healthier, wealthier in the process. There is no obligation to apply. And once you do apply we will then set up a discovery consult with me. Because what is of utmost importance to me is the integrity of this container. And I want to make sure that it’s the right container for you and that it’s going to be a great relationship and a great match both ways.

So, if you have any questions about this you can email us support@leahcb.com. You can also email us if you are interested in private coaching. You can also go directly to my website www.leahcb.com, click on the mastermind link and find the link to send in your application there.

So, to close today, a little bit of a confession, not a little bit, a lot of bit. When I first heard about Michael Ray and teaching a Stanford Business School course on creativity I kind of was not interested, not at all. I wasn’t turned on at all. I thought this was just going to be sort of like a hack, a way of cultivating more brainstorming techniques, or tips for more productive or better meetings. And then I decided to suspend my judgment and investigate.

And what I found was very rich, including an article by Fast Company where it even says this, for Ray, creativity is not an every now and again exercise, the search for one great eureka moment. Nor is it about coming up with an incredible idea, the next billion dollar innovation. For Ray, creativity is a way of life. Forget cookie cutter brainstorming techniques or tips for better meanings. Underlying Ray’s course is a search for answers to two fundamental questions which I have shared, who is myself and what is my work.

And then he goes on to say, you can’t know what and how you want to create until you know who you are and what you hope to do with your life. I want to offer those words to you again. One of the gifts of answering these questions, who is myself and what is my work is that you can’t know what and how you want to create until you know who you are and what you hope to do with your life.

He goes on to say, in order to deal with the chaos that exists in the world today you need some grounding. That grounding best comes from knowing who you are in a rich sense. So that as things change you know what your resources are and what you can bring to a situation. That way you don’t have to worry, am I capable of doing this. You already know the answer. He continues, the creativity that I’m talking about is different from problem solving. It’s different from just coming up with ideas.

And he goes on to say, there is another constant in the world in addition to change. It’s your own internal creativity, that’s always there for you. And that also is one of my intentions in sharing this podcast is to invite you to a way of life where you feel ignited from the inside out, where you come home to yourself again and remember what life can be. Dialoging with your capital-C Creativity, dialoging with your greatness, your highest self, your deepest truth, something greater than you that wants to happen through you.

The richness that can provide to you, the stability, the grounding might sound like a paradox, that dialoging with your higher self can ground you but it’s true. And I think these are fundamental practices to aid in human evolution, and really giving us the ability to respond to the changing world in ever increasingly conscious and truly creative ways.

Have a beautiful week everyone and I look forward to talking with you next time.