A weird but helpful way to overcome self-doubt

Self-doubt seems to be required to be an artist. It is not fair because we are all so thirsty for communicating and connecting through our art, but self-doubt gets on the way and wants us to stay shut. Boo. I assure you that you are not the only one doubting yourself, so I thought it would be helpful to share an interesting way I learned to fight it.

While reading about relationships

In reading a book titled Hold Me Tight, the author tells the story of a patient who had surgery on her tonsils and the nurse advice to vigorously chew gum to alleviate the cramps in her mouth.

Can you imagine the pain? Even while I was reading, I could feel the pain

“How can she say that? Is she crazy?” She was not and I’ll tell you why

Be creative to overcome self-doubt

When we are wounded, our muscles cramp around the area to protect it from more problems. The solution to helping these muscles relax again is to use them. It is basically to tell them that everything is all right and they can get back to their place.

So I thought this is so relatable to a composer’s life!

When someone tells us that we are not good enough, that our voice is not good, or that we should not create anymore, we feel so depressed that we froze. We stop making music altogether 🙁

What if all we need is to tell our muscles that everything is ok? After all, when someone tells us these terrible things, our mind cramps.

Create even more music!

Reading this book made me realize that when we are wounded is when we need to create more. Even if hard, it can be cathartic to remind ourselves that we are artists and that we create our world. Our response needs to make us feel that we are ok.

To compose more, to sing more, to use our muscles to help them not cramp around our creative center: our imagination.