Creativity can be easy to chase, but hard to capture, especially when you’re feeling anxious. When we’re worried, our productivity is bound to take a dip, and this can have a multiplicative effect on our anxiety. We cannot work because we feel so anxious, but we are only so anxious because we cannot work. Anxiety can become a vicious cycle when you don’t have the right tools to cope with it. But what tools do we need at our disposal to break out of our anxiety, and into the creative life that we desire? 

“Because it is possible to create — creating one’s self, willing to be one’s self, as well as creating in all the innumerable daily activities (and these are two phases of the same process) — one has anxiety. One would have no anxiety if there were no possibility whatever.” – Rollo May, The Meaning of Anxiety

Does Anxiety Affect Creativity?

Yes! This study by Byron, Khazanchi, and Nazarian suggests that while high levels of uncontrollable stress were correlated with lessened creativity, low levels of stress were actually correlated with improved creativity. This suggests to me something counter-intuitive and fascinating. When stress and anxiety aren’t tended to, our creativity languishes, but when that stress is properly managed and feels within our control, our creativity is given the opportunity to flourish.  

“Anxiety is the handmaiden of creativity.” – T. S. Eliot

How Do I Get Over Creative Anxiety? 

There is no one magic pill that can solve the problem of anxiety. There are many techniques that can lessen the intensity of our anxiety. There are many methods to recognize our anxiety and reduce its impact on our day-to-day life. But in order to truly manage your anxiety, you will likely need several different sorts of tools, and when one of them isn’t working, you must simply try another. Here are just a few that could be helpful for stoking the fire of your creativity: 

• Setting Intentions. Our persistent worries about the future can be one of the most crippling sources of anxiety bouncing around in our minds. We’ll say to ourselves over and over how badly something will go, and it will only add fuel to our anxious fire. What if we did the exact opposite of that? Setting intentions is a simple thought work technique where we write our hopes for the future down matter-of-factly and then say them out loud over and over again. By doing this, we are affirming to ourselves what we wish to happen, as opposed to what we fear will happen. By setting the right intentions, we can keep in mind that there is reason for hope in our future.  
• Self-Compassion. Anxiety is already bad enough, and it’s made even worse when we have to handle it while we manage the snide comments of our own biggest critic (ourselves). By practicing our patience, kindness, and love for ourselves, we can learn how to be less self-critical and walk free of the burden of self-hatred. 

• Calming Your Nervous System. Our minds and bodies are inextricably connected. When we first come to understand the mind-body connection, it can feel like a hassle. When our mind hurts, our body hurts. When our body falters, our mind falters. Shouldn’t having just one of the two in pain be enough? But once we’ve learned to manage the impacts of stress on our body and mind, we can use this connection to improve our productivity, happiness, and even our creativity! By recognizing when your anxiety is overwhelming you, you can use your mind to calm down your body and vice-versa. 

“The best use of creativity is imagination. The worst use of creativity is anxiety.” – Deepak Chopra

How To Be Creative When You’re Feeling Stressed

So, if we want to manage our anxiety so that our creativity can come into bloom, what tools can we use? It’s a perfectly simple and reasonable question, but it’s one with a lot of different answers. You might read these options and not know intuitively which ones will be most helpful for you. Putting together a toolkit for your anxiety can be a process of trial and error, that’s why many people seek out an expert to help them develop their toolkit and move through their anxiety. When you meet with our therapists in St Petersburg, FL, they will help you understand what blocks are keeping you from accessing your creativity through art therapy and  getting in touch with the body.

Integrative Counsel proudly offers virtual Art Therapy with Quinn. Quinn uses virtual art therapy to treat individuals with OCD and Anxiety, as well as those undergoing a major life transition or adjustment and are  experiencing grief. Click here to schedule your virtual art therapy session!

Sunny Ebsary is an educator, multi-modal artist, and writer specializing in the intersection of myth and mental health. Sunny’s writing walks the line between poetic and logical, giving readers a chance to interface with the mind and imagination. Sunny’s been putting pen to paper since he was a child, writing everything from albums, novels, and plays, to essays, interactive games, and of course, many articles! While studying both psychology and writing, he realized his real passion in life was helping others unlock their creative spark. Whether he’s leading a D&D game, directing a production, or diving deep into the brain, you can be sure Sunny will be ushering you toward finding meaning in your life.