How to Stop Letting the Past Rule the Present

There is abundant, helpful, accurate and often free information everywhere that will teach you how to get your art into the world.

But if you can’t apply the information, you might be affected by trauma.

Trauma causes humans to create parts inside us that attempt to protect us from further harm. One of the most identifiable parts inside every artist and most all other humans is the inner critic. That part has created a long list of rules to live by, so your caregivers didn’t put you out on the front stoop and change the locks.

It’s not bad to have an inner critic, or any of the other parts inside, and they were helpful for our four-year-old selves who would otherwise run around naked in the grocery store.

But as adults, they should'n’t run the show. As long as you’re living your life by a set of rules you created for yourself when you were young, you’re susceptible to believing the voice that says your work isn’t any good. It might browbeat you to the point that you can’t even start (or finish) anything, nor show it to anyone.

The parts of you with these rulebooks block you from reality. If you don’t trust yourself to be a grown up, able to respond to life with the right action at the right time, it’s impossible to stop and look and ask yourself—what’s really true here?

The True Eyes Practice will help you identify, communicate with, and calm the parts of you that arose from trauma, so you can see the truth, in the present moment, and get your work into the world.

What to Do Next

1.     Take the “Is Trauma Affecting My Creative Practice,” questionnaire.

2.     Get Artists Prosper!. This book will help you get to know some of the parts within you, understand their purpose, find out what they’re concerned about, what they fear, what they protect you from, so you can see reality as it is. The payoff: freedom, more authentic self-expression and more energy. If you enjoy drawing or writing to express your feelings, get the accompanying workbook, Artists Unstuck!

3.     Then, if you want to get your art into the world, get Passion, Plan, Profit: 12 Simple Steps to Convert Your Passion Into A Solid Business. This book will take you through making a business plan for your work.

4.     To see how other artists get their work into the world, check out the videos on the ArtDialog channel.