Guest Post: Jeff and Julie Crabtree

Today’s blog post is a guest blog from my friends Jeff and Julie Crabtree, the authors of Living with a Creative Mind. They are two remarkable people, a musician and a psychologist, who have written the most important book on the way that Creative People think and work. And trust me, Jeff and Julie know their shit, so you’re going to want to read this blog through thoroughly, then you’re going to want to buy their book. I could not recommend it highly enough. It’s the kind of book where you start nodding along very quickly, recognising yourself in the behaviour described. Enjoy the blog post and buy the book.

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We are the authors of the book Living with a Creative Mind, a survival guide for creative people and their friends and colleagues. We are all about how creative people work, and how to help them become more productive. For the performing artist (lets call him Adrian), this means understanding and managing the unique pressures of performance. His journey (an extract from Chapter 2 of our book) helps us understand how the pressures of performance affect the performer.

Adrian has just come off stage knowing he nailed opening night. The crowd was with him and he knew that he had them with him the whole way. It was electric. He is buzzing, feeling the euphoria of the release of pressure and tension that built up before the performance. Smiling and elated; his friends are laughing at all his jokes. He is thinking, “I am so good.” He stays up until four in the morning. Performance number two is the next day but he doesn’t want to lose this feeling. Plus he is young, full of energy – he can make it happen.
Next day, during the second performance, he misses a cue, stumbles over a line and his leading lady makes a comment as they pass each other on the way to the dressing room: “What happened to you tonight?” The applause was not quite as electric as last night. Adrian begins to feel a little sick in the stomach, like he is losing his grip. That old black doubt creeps into the back of his mind and takes hold: you are a fake, you knew all along you never had real talent, they’re going to get rid of you, they’re probably all in the pub now talking about how terrible you are. What starts as twinges of doubt is reinforced by some old thoughts and is soon developing into paranoia.
Adrian’s mood plummets. Suddenly he is obsessing over small aspects of the show. He phones a friend and makes them come round and rehearse a scene over and over. The smallest details are issues for him. Adrian has become hypersensitive. Self-assurance has become self-doubt, and he starts looking for little clues in the way others react to him that will confirm what he now dreads but secretly believes is true: it’s over for him!

How would we help Adrian?

The main thing would be to help Adrian realize that the natural state of the creative mind is tidal. So for a performer, the ups and downs are normal. You don’t overcome the cyclical or tidal nature, but you learn how to navigate it. So how do you do that?

If we were working with Adrian we would help him become aware of his sleep/ wake pattern. When he is in his up/high energy – wired phase – particularly after performances- it would be easy to begin a pattern of getting to sleep very late – feeling like he needs little sleep. Actors with longevity learn to respect their sleep/wake cycle and work to discipline and train their physiology to get sleep – despite the highs of performance.

We would also begin to explore his self-talk (the constant dialogue in our head, at the threshold of our consciousness, that forms our view of who we are in the world). The tension between the need for perfection and attention to detail produces fear and cripples a performance. The idea that “everything has to be perfect for me to be good” is in fact a lie that destroys the creative mind. Introducing the gift of imperfection to our self-talk will help Adrian embrace those times when his performance is not the way he would like it.

Finally, Adrian needs affirmation more than anything else after his second performance. An actor’s social world can be ruthless. Having one or two friends who will affirm Adrian without any agenda is crucial. Actors will always have bad shows; bad reviews and off nights but having friends who can affirm you is essential to coping with the highs and lows.

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If like me, you were thinking “yeah, a book on creativity, I need that like a hole in the head”, you’ll know from this blog post that Jeff and Julie are no bullshitters, they really know their shit, they’ve done their homework and this book can actually help those of us that struggle with the perils of having a creative mind, being a squiggly line in a world of squares. Buy the book folks, buy two, one for you, and one for the people in your life that don’t ‘get it’, because this book is closest I’ve ever come to feeling okay about being a freak.