My First Post
What if the meaning of life is not to find your purpose, but simply to create?
A Creative Manifesto
I believe the meaning of life is not to find your purpose, but simply to create. *
I believe that creativity is contagious and art in all its forms can be inspired and be inspiring to all its other forms.
I believe that when writers, artists, crafters, dancers, musicians and other makers come together, they can speak a common language of creativity.
I believe there is always more to learn from intuition and that it is intuition that leads to new insights and techniques in art.
I believe it’s more truthful to call myself a creative instead of an author, or a metalsmith or a jeweler or a crocheter or a crafter, although I am all of those, because creativity is the constant - the mediums I use are merely part of my current lifestyle restrictions or allowances.
I believe any and all methods of creating are of equal value to humankind.
*Credit to Bob Dylan for #
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Sharing - What If?
What if the meaning of life is not to find your purpose but simply to create?
I find such a joyful freedom in that concept. It makes me approach writing as a child who has no purpose other than to play. It allows me to discover words and ideas instead of twisting and contorting them. It lets me embrace what is beneath the surface. I have no reason to resist.
What if you called yourself a creative instead of limiting your identity to a single application of your creativity?
Partitioning parts of my creative self is most obvious when it comes to an online presence. Social media has demanded we be one thing or another. I admit I’m still finding my way online to be more than one hashtag. In real life though, I know this and I live this. It takes the pressure off my interests. I don’t have to choose one over the other. They don’t have to compete. I can have an idea first and decide which medium to bring it to.
What if you truly believed and advocated that any and all methods of creating are of equal value?
Can you imagine if Creatives were all equally valued? If the cook who created the spice mixes was as valued as the symphony composer, as the granny who crocheted a blanket, as the writer of an instant classic, as the writer of a romance, as the carver of a wooden spoon? That sounds like Utopia to me, but the thing is, I believe it, so, for me, it’s here. It can be here for you too. Imagine.
Goals and Expectations
Do you believe creativity is contagious? Let’s inspire each other by sharing our artistic challenges and joys, our curiosity and our hard-earned insights. I think we’ll find that what is true in one medium is just as true in another. For example, in an upcoming newsletter I’ll write on trying to find my Voice, something essential for any type of artist to define and yet so difficult to describe.
You can expect me to share a newsletter once a week, mostly from my novel writing perspective. We can have a community that is energizing and supportive of our art-making.
That sounds like fun, doesn’t it? That sounds like something I want to read.
About Me
It’s not about me and it’s not about writing fiction, although the writer in me is what you'll see here, mostly. My writing name is Ada Austen. I write novels. In real life, I call myself a Creative who finds my outlet not only in words, but also in metalworking (a jeweler/silversmith), crocheting, collage, and paint. I live in Asbury Park, NJ, an interesting, musical and artsy little boardwalk City by the Sea that is both haunted and inspired by its past (as am I).
I’m currently working on my third novel. By now I understand that each novel, like a person, is unique and has a story of its own that as an author I can either choose to dig deeper to discover or I can hold fast to my previous design. Neither way is right or wrong. It’s just a choice to write one novel or another. The novel I finish today will not be, could not be, the same story I finished last week, last month, last year. Everything in life is a choice. Every word, sentence, paragraph and structure in a novel is a choice, too. So far, in this novel, I’m choosing to keep digging to discover where intuition and instinct will bring the story. It’s fun, fascinating and quite lonely to question the assumptions and break rules that writers today are told to follow. I was told recently in a workshop (that I spent $3000 to attend) that “unless you’re a genius, you need to follow one of these five structures.”
That was disappointing. I don’t consider myself a genius. All I know is that this story isn’t fitting into one of those taught-to-death and read-to-death structures. It is fitting into a pattern that I have found in some well-received works, so I don’t think I’m on the wrong path; I’m just on one that isn’t well lit. Are you on this path, too?
That’s one reason I came to Substack. I’m looking for a community of Creatives, especially writers, that are willing to listen to their intuition and to share their own truth to discover a way to tell their story, in whatever medium they express it. Sometimes it will fall into the currently expected guidelines and sometimes it will fall outside those norms. I’m here to support it wherever it lands and to support you. I’m here for the story.
Your free substack subscription inspires me to share my truth. It lets me know I’m not writing into a void (blogging) or to the algorithm (social media). It helps create a community with comments and sharing that in the end, can inspire and support us all. Thank you so much. You are creating a community by subscribing.
For now, all of my newsletter is available for free. I really hate it when I’m reading something good and the paywall pops up, don’t you? We can not pay for everything we want to read and some of us can’t pay for anything. I see you. (I am you.) I’ve turned on paid subscriptions only for those who have the means and the inclination to support this work financially. If you do, please know you have my deepest thanks.
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This Is Not About is written by Ada Austen, the author of Better Late Than Never, a multicultural second-chance romance set on the beaches and boardwalks of the New Jersey Shore. It is the New Jersey Romance Writers 2021 Golden Leaf Winner - Best Book by NJ Author.