Why do we create?

What's the point in all this creation when the world is ending?

I’ve been thinking a lot about writing. Well creativity in particular, but for me creativity is (mostly) my writing.

Specifically, I’ve been thinking about what’s the point in this writing, in this creation. Why do I spend so much time putting pen to paper and fingers to keyboard when I ‘should’ be spending time doing…real life stuff? Lofty, I know, but I think I’m referring to ‘real life activism’, like throwing myself in front of a bulldozer or chaining myself or a tree. (Or whatever my brain sees ‘real’ activism as.)

I have felt similarly about reading. I love to read about climate change and collapse, but I wonder if filling myself up with all these thoughts and ideas and concepts, all these ways of living and thinking, actually does anything? Does it HELP anyone? I worry it's another place where I don’t DO anything, that I’m not doing the right thing. 

I know that if no one read a word I said I would keep writing. Probably in a less polished way, but I would. You can see this in my overflowing notes app and journals bulging out of my bookshelf. I’m not ‘creating content’ for the sake of content, this writing keeps me sane, and it balances out the amount of words I consume. 

But a more important question right now would be: if no one read a word I wrote, would I still feel like I’m doing my flavour of activism? The answer is, perhaps surprisingly, YES. Because I still feel like I’m doing the internal work necessary, the work to become the kind of person I want to be when facing The End Of The World¹.  

I’ve came to the conclusion, with the support of Brian Mclaren’s new book Life After Doom², that this creation, this writing, this reading, this talking, is aiding us in building the emotional resilience we need to survive the turbulence of a future under the climate crisis. 

There’s a lot involved in the emotional work of preparing for The End Of The World. It’s facing the horror and the grief, unpicking old learnt behaviours and learning new healthy behaviours. It's going through the grieving cycle and going through it again, it’s accepting a different kind of future than we originally hoped for, it’s hoping for a better future than we originally expected. 

It’s trying to understand ourselves down to the deepest core of our being. Finding how to stay generous, courageous, and graceful, and keeping our belief in humanity as we see great horrors unfold. 

I like to think I’m building the skills and resilience I need now to help steward others through our future. Many people, even the majority of people, who will be facing our upcoming collapse–whatever it looks like–will probably be realising the instability of business as usual for the first time–and it will be fucking terrifying. If I can find peace at the edges of the emotional turmoil for myself, then perhaps I can help others find the peace there when they really need it. 

Brian writes: "Just as children need wise adults to lead them towards adulthood, adults need wiser adults, sages, people who can lead them on the path of wisdom." Now I’m not sure I’ve quite achieved the title of ‘wiser adult’ yet, I feel this is what other people’s creation brings me. The words I read in books and articles support me in forging my own path of wisdom, of bringing this wisdom further out. 

Sarah from

My Subschtick

discussed in a (really great!!) recent article about writing “to transform your reader rather than assert something novel”, a perspective that really spoke to me. Taking away the pressure to always present something NEW and EXCITING, and simply writing to bring existing ideas across in different ways is so important. As many activists have said, we already have everything we need to end climate change, we just need to find ways to bring it into the public consciousness, to make the actions seem like they have always been part of our way of living. 

None of this is to say we should all stop chaining ourselves to trees (I fear if we do there will be no trees left to chain ourselves to), but can we allow ourselves to balance the internal work with the external work without the endless guilt of needing to do more? 

There will always be more to do. There will always be more we think we should be doing. 

But right now this is where I have landed, this is what I’m called to do. Whether that’s because writing is ‘easy’ for me, or if it’s just right for me, it is what I've chosen to dedicate my time to right now, and maybe that can be enough.³ Because It’s not one or the other. It isn’t internal work versus holding placards on the streets. They feed into each other, and both are necessary for the work that needs to be done.  

Reading allows me to learn from wiser adults. Writing keeps me from losing my mind. Both allow me to build the courage I need to keep hoping, to keep going, to keep seeing the world as a beautiful place. Doing so will feed into every other undertaking I do, whether it's out-and-loud activism, or whether it's holding my loved one’s hands through their grief. 

P.S. If you enjoy my writing, you can buy me a coffee to fuel my work.

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I’ve managed to build up fear around writing, and the quality, or even worthiness, of my writing recently, and I’ve scared myself off a bit. I would like to go back to the act of writing about what interests me and putting things out there without the fear of worthiness. So that is what I’m going to try to do. :)  

Substacks I’ve enjoyed recently:

Do We Need New Ideas, or Better Influencers? by

Sarah

Mowed Lawns and Bald Vaginas by

Gregory Pettys

Is It Even Fun To Constantly Want Things? by

Totally Recommend

1. Whatever the End Of The World looks like.

2. Brian sent me his newest book Life After Doom and I absolutely LOVE IT. Please read it.

3. Or perhaps I’m just telling myself this. Who knows!