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Creativity and Suffering with Katy Stafford and Cathy Loerzel
73 Plays1 month ago
Does all great art flow from suffering? Does the act of creating inherently bring suffering in its wake? How do we navigate the pain and beauty of creation? In this episode Katy Stafford and Cathy Loerzel reflect on their creative endeavors, from the most significant to the most mundane. Together, they ponder, "What does it cost us to create?" While also exploring why they keep creating even when it hurts. Whether or not you imagine yourself to be creative, this episode is for you and the important creative work you bring to you life. Join for a playful and reflective conversation.
For more stories from brave, ordinary women, join us at Red Tent Living.
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Transcript
Introduction to Red Tent Living Podcast
00:00:01
Speaker
I'm Katie Stafford, and this is the Red Tent Living Podcast, where brave women host honest conversations about our beautiful and hard ordinary. Each week, we share stories with the hope of seeing one another a little better and affirming each other across different seasons and perspectives.
Welcoming Kathy & Discussing Busy Life
00:00:22
Speaker
We're excited for you to join us. Welcome to our table. Kathy, hello. Hi, Katie.
00:00:31
Speaker
How are you? I'm doing fine. How are you doing? Good, good. I know we were chatting just before this about life being busy and it being a bit of a rush season. Mm hmm. Yeah, I know. But don't don't you get tired? Like I feel a little bit convicted about like how many of us show up in a spaces and all we're talking about is how tired we are or how busy everything is.
00:00:57
Speaker
Yeah. Do you know what I mean? i I do know what you mean. I headed into a ah week of vacation and still feeling the like work brain. Yeah. I know. I've been aware of like that. Like, is that a currency that we're all just in where it's like, you know, if you're not busy, then like there's something wrong. That's right. You're not worthy. right If you're not overwhelmed, then you're certainly not doing enough. I want to get on a podcast at some point and now where I'm like, yeah, I'm just doing like really fine.
Theme: Creativity and Suffering
00:01:27
Speaker
Chill. This is my one thing for the day. No big deal. Yeah. Well, today we are talking about creativity and suffering, which I, as mom and I were planning the themes. As mom and I were planning the themes, I came up with this one and I was like, so I should assign it to myself. I was like, wow, like that's a heavy hitter. I know.
00:01:50
Speaker
yeah Okay. How was it for you? How is it for you sitting with this idea? Well, I got your email and I think I had to read it four times where I was like, what are we talking about? Creativity, suffering, and and I was like, i it's it's like a mind block, I think, yeah on purpose. Yeah. Because we don't actually want to talk about how those two things are linked. h But they are deeply linked.
00:02:17
Speaker
Yeah, I agree. as i As I was sitting kind of prepping in my mind, what did I want to talk about? I could feel a natural resistance, even though I know it's so important to that like that my best creative work has been birthed out of spaces of suffering and our relationship with suffering. yeah My brain was still a little bit like, ah, we don't have to dive back in, right? Right.
00:02:41
Speaker
right Yes. We did it once. Right. We made it. And maybe since the suffering happens so much the first time, I can keep creating and not have to suffer the next time. Right. Like I've earned my way through. Right.
Katie's Writing Journey
00:02:54
Speaker
Yeah. That's. Does that hold true for you? It does not. It does not. No. I know. Yeah. It's great. I mean, I loved the, the comic books that made me think and I'm like, gosh, you know, like I was, I was actually talking to your mom. We did a sacred interruption a couple of weeks or a lot. I don't even know.
00:03:11
Speaker
When? A week ago? I don't know. And, you know, she's like, you're doing a podcast, like, yeah, you know, create, I have to bring it back up. I'm like, I don't even know creativity and suffering. And she's like, and I was like, I don't have any stories about that. She's like, yeah, your whole life is a story about that. And I was like, oh dad that's sad. That's true. I don't want to talk about it, but I will. Yeah.
00:03:32
Speaker
Yeah, i we can transition in like what I'm holding, what I'm bringing into today. As I thought about the theme, I have on this back shelf behind me, there are these two spiral bound manuscripts. They're the two books that I've written. They're both memoir. They're not published. That's a dream for some day, but who knows, right? like i will I will probably write half a dozen more of those in my life just because it's good for me, right? like yeah i love I love the moment when life like transitions into story, into narrative, like stitching it back through. Because when you're living it, you're not quite sure what the threads are yet. But as you look back,
00:04:15
Speaker
and mine it and think about where you've gone. like I love that see transition and I think it's very grounding just personally for me. But um as I was contemplating this conversation with you, of those two books, the first one was about my four years in college and I learned a lot writing that manuscript. it was very It's very long and I don't know that I'd want it to be published today.
00:04:42
Speaker
It's probably got a little bit of gratuitous 20 year old angst. But the second manuscript is written about love and kind of my journey with love. And I read it back. I didn't read the whole thing, but I started like flipping back through it, prepping for this conversation. And I still love it. Like it's got all this tender space for me. Like there were moments that I cried. There were moments that I laughed.
00:05:11
Speaker
um And I like the story that I trace through that memoir is a young girl who's trying to figure out what love is and
Growth After Personal Challenges
00:05:22
Speaker
kind of learning those hard lessons I think a lot of us learn in our early teen years of maybe what love isn't or where we're foolish for hoping for love.
00:05:32
Speaker
And then it quickly transitions into my early 20s and I did not have tons of love experience. Had a couple boyfriends, not a ton of physicality to my relationships. So by the time that I was in my mid 20s, I was pretty sure like something was broken with me. And I was very embarrassed about it. It was like, I can't meet women on this stage. I don't know how to interact with men on this stage.
00:06:01
Speaker
enter the man who swept me off my feet and into this love story that was everything a girl would hope to tell. But that's that's not the book. The book is what happens after he and I experience a rupture and a broken engagement. And so then it's like,
00:06:19
Speaker
everything I came to believe about myself because of how he saw me, I then had the opportunity to grapple with, can I see myself this way? Can I like come home to my own beauty and worth and kind of believe that I'm worth a love story, even when I'm outside of one? and So it's a book birthed of a ton of suffering. And that was not the book I was ready to write in the middle of it. But like, as I started, it was probably It was probably two years after the broken engagement that I was like, I think I want to write this. And then I started like working it through and came to something that I really loved that like softened in me. And it was about a lot of self-acceptance. It was about learning how to forgive that man.
00:07:09
Speaker
and kind of blessing him on his journey. And then the wild twist at the end is three years after that, we ended up back together. And I finished the book six months after we got married. So that that's not the ending of the book. The book is about me, but that that's how that all happened. So, you know, I sit with it today and I'm still very enchanted by that book and by the parts of myself that I got to meet through that book. And it's sort of this unique place of, you know, after I finished it, I gave it to, to Aaron to read. And we got to have the experience of like, I shared my whole side of that story. And he was living a different story with the same rupture at the same time. And so like,
00:08:01
Speaker
I think it was a week after I gave it to him that I was like, what'd you think? And he's like, I haven't finished it yet. It's very painful for me to read. Like it brings really visceral memories, different memories for me as I'm like hearing what you're grappling.
00:08:17
Speaker
with. And so like, that has been as I'm holding that book and how much I love it. I'm also holding this like tender space of like, it's not ready, I want it to be ready for the world someday, but I haven't shopped it around because it's like who I am and who Erin is and what we both navigated in that space is really tender. And it's maybe not time for like a public stage. I mean, that was three years ago now, but so maybe it is time to be thinking about it again. But through that whole process, like I think as I think about the themes of creativity and suffering,
00:08:58
Speaker
I'm mindful of the ah constant like reworking and revisiting that we do and how we like shift in position to our stories and our creativity and our art and how it can keep becoming over a time. And that can actually be beautiful too, like sitting in relationship with our work, letting it marinade, maybe not acting on it right away or being recognized for it right away, but letting it keep becoming.
Balancing Storytelling and Privacy
00:09:26
Speaker
And it makes me wonder about, well, the um the word exposure keeps coming up. like when you if you went Once you're ready to put that book out there, right the inner your inner world, your inner creativity, the the inner thoughts that have been so sweet for you to hold, to work through, to to even help you understand your own suffering then is public. Right. For consumption at some level. Right.
00:09:53
Speaker
right and And there's a massive risk in that. Totally. Yeah. What's what's your sense of, like is that is that part of what you're waiting for to be ready? Or what's your what's your hesitation around it? like What's your gut say you're waiting for? I do think there's some some recognition reckoning of exposure. like The first draft of a book, I don't know if you're like this, but I wrote it with the rules of like nobody's name has to change yet. nobody like I just wrote it the way I hold it as truth in my story.
00:10:22
Speaker
And certainly some of those things would need to change, right? Because there's multiple characters who maybe need like, he have not necessarily granted permission. So that kind of reworking would be a step. I think the biggest piece though is wanting to hold us sacred. Not just my journey in that love story, but Aaron's journey in that love story. And that would probably have been different. If we didn't end up together, like certainly I would want his permission, but there's a There's an intimacy there and like a depth of care where it's like, I don't need to rush this. like yeah I'm maybe sharing things more comfortably publicly that it's like he would prefer to just talk about with his two best friends and his therapist. right like that kind There can be a difference in how we would hold those.
00:11:11
Speaker
yeah What do you think? Is it okay for me to jump in? Is this the part where I'm like, it's happening. Okay, great, great. No, it just makes me curious about what creativity has meant for you. Like where it's been placed in your life around healing, ah ah around where you find yourself in purpose.
00:11:31
Speaker
i mean I know ah your podcast listeners know this, but you know you're a very creative woman. you know You write, you do marketing, you do the Red Tent Living. There's a lot of creativity that you've brought into this world. um where What's your relationship with it been?
00:11:48
Speaker
I think my relationship with creativity so started started young and started with imagination. like My siblings and I were very playful and I was very drawn to books. like I just loved worlds. right and And then as I transitioned into like high school, found that writing became like, I didn't necessarily know how I felt or thought about a thing until I gave myself permission to write it out of my body. Like, um and I think there's some some coping and like shadow side there of like how I ordered my world, how I kept it, you know, safe. But writing, journaling became a very comforting, like, this is what I have to do. And so as ah as a healing thread, that carry, that's always carried through. Yeah.
Creativity's Intimate Nature
00:12:44
Speaker
And what's your sense of the cost? The cost to create. I feel like it requires a
00:12:51
Speaker
present and a quietness that sometimes I flee from. see Just because it's like at the end of what can feel stressful or overwhelming sometimes like and more and more culturally, then the numb out or the the cheaper distraction is very tempting compared to the like, let me go into the depths, let me clear the space, let me there's a ritual to writing, right? At least for me, like,
00:13:23
Speaker
the going upstairs, the lighting the candle at my writing desk, the growing quiet, the letting whatever the feelings are just be. Because sometimes those feelings are unkempt and ke and like not what you want to feel. You're like, right I don't want to engage that about life right now or about that individual in my life right now. I'd rather, I don't have time for this. I'd rather just push through by baking chocolate chip cookies and watching cheap television, but television right? like And we'll be fine. Yeah. So the cost of creativity, I mean, part of what you're saying is is being, youre you have to then be truly present to what's around you and become friends with the feelings that we've pushed off, the shadow that we don't want to contend with.
00:14:10
Speaker
and I think that that is where you know to to truly create means looking at parts of ourselves, looking at parts of the world that are very difficult and to then find beauty and goodness in them or bring them to to out you know to to be seen or to be engaged with. yeah it's It's a very risky endeavor to to do that. and you know and Again, I think part of why we don't necessarily want to talk about how closely linked creativity and suffering is is because we want We want the creativity without the cost. And there's a and I think you know my my theory is that we are all born with very specific gifts that arc that were created to bring forth into the world to help, to contribute. right we We all have something in us that, and again, this is my personal theology, like not everyone will align with that, but I found a lot of comfort in it where
00:15:02
Speaker
I think you know there there are specific things that we we get to help contribute to based on the uniqueness of what we bring to the world or how we're going to see or how we're going to write. And and there's something lovely about that. And even you were talking about the idealism of your 20s or college years where there's a sense of like, oh, just give me a chance and I'll do it. I'll do it better. And you know it just put me in charge. And maybe that was just me.
00:15:28
Speaker
No, that wasn't just you. That was definitely me. Great. You know, there's there's this sense of just give me a chance and I'll do it better. And then, and then life has this way of humbling you. Where, where you start to, you know, get out there and be like, yeah, I'm gonna, I'm gonna do it and and I'm gonna be better than my parents. And and we have to do, we have to have that in order to, to risk or to try. And, and it's a, and it's a lovely thing that exuberance of, of the youthfulness of college, like all you know where you're still protesting in the streets and doing all these things and believing that, you know, your voice matters. where It does. And after a long while in the seat, you're like, wow, it doesn't matter nearly as much as I thought it would. And I still have something that I'm meant to contribute and create on behalf of the world, but it may be a lot smaller.
00:16:16
Speaker
and more insignificant than I thought in the beginning. yeah that i I feel that very deeply. i think about every Every time I think about that, like I'm actually drawn back to the story of the people of Israel like wandering with the Promised Land, and I always think about the generations that died in the middle. totally Because the sermons the sermons are always this grand arc of like, as if you got to complete the whole story, right where it's like,
00:16:45
Speaker
And then there was the wandering and then they made it to the Promised Land and it's like, no, they didn't all. like A lot of them lived in tents going, what the heck are we doing? And literally why does it matter? Does it matter that we gather at our little fire every night and we make our food and we tell our stories? Because it kind of feels like it doesn't. right But if we hadn't done that, then like the stories wouldn't have lived on. Absolutely.
00:17:10
Speaker
It's that ordinary, but important. It's that show up, but you're not going to change the world. You're going to move a little bit of it, maybe. And it'll be really intimate. It'll be the people right there at your fire. I love that image because I think we do think that creativity ends up being, like I do, I wrote a book. I think part of the book is about, it talks about calling, I think. I don't know. I don't even remember anymore.
00:17:38
Speaker
I think it's even in the title. I honestly don't remember. All I know is that a lot of times where I'm asked to talk about the book, people want to talk about calling. And I'm like, I will talk to you about calling, but you're not going to like what I have to say because calling is not grandiose.
00:17:57
Speaker
Right? Calling is about like, how faithful are you being to doing your dishes? Right? Being present. Like my, you know, my kids need to be picked up in an hour. Like, am I going to be able to be present enough and not distracted by other things to like really be with them?
00:18:13
Speaker
Right? That's my calling. and And it's a lot more insignificant than we think. And and I think even when talking about creativity, right? We think that we want to create big things, but we're not actually creating in the really small moments where we could create meaning in very, very important ways.
00:18:33
Speaker
um that bring meaning to, like you said, your circle, your fire, right? So like every fire of the Israelites that were traveling in the desert, you know, they had fires all over and every fire needed a storyteller. Right. Every fire needed a place where they could come and they could share their experiences from the day and they could feel connected. Well, those storytellers aren't like in scripture being talked about, right? They're not named. They're not named, right?
00:18:59
Speaker
But they had a role to play in the world that they were in, and it was lovely and beautiful. And are they willing to stay in that day in and day out and stay faithful to what's in front of them, rather than believing that they have to make it to the promised land? I mean, Moses didn't make it to the promised land. Right. Right.
00:19:18
Speaker
So like you know Moses, they went into retirement because he made a mistake. God bless. you know like The whole story is just bananas. But I don't know. i mean This goes off the topic.
Embracing Ordinary Creativity
00:19:29
Speaker
but But I do think that we just don't want to grapple with the ordinary. And then when you do create, there's there's an exposure. Every time, I don't know if you have friends and that you guys have over for dinner. We love having people over for dinner. And maybe this will be my story about creativity and suffering.
00:19:47
Speaker
Um, we, we love having people over for dinner and we love hosting and every time you reach out and send out an invitation to say, Hey. You know, you guys want to come over. One, you're putting yourself out there saying, I'm someone that someone else should want to be with. I'm a fun person. Like come and spend time with me. ah Good time. Right? Like, yeah come on over. Two, you know, you're prepping. You're having to to prepare and believe that you can create a meal, that you can host a space, that you can create hospitality. Three, you're putting yourself out there to the degree that people can say yes or no. Right?
00:20:24
Speaker
and And then, let's say they say yes and they come over and you have a lovely evening. Well, now now there's a sense of reciprocity. Like, well, did they did they really have a good time because we haven't we haven't been invited to their house? I haven't heard from them again. Like, how come we're always the people inviting people over? Or, you know, whatever your story is, right? Or I i invited all these people and no one came or only one couple came and what about the It's like every single moment that we're extending ourselves out there and saying our idea is something that that may bring goodness to the to to someone else's life, that's creativity, right? And every time you do that, you are exposing yourself. You're exposing your desire, your ideas, what you think is beautiful, the food that you like to eat, who you would want around your table. I mean, it's something so simple as a dinner party that
00:21:16
Speaker
that there's there's a reason that a lot of people don't invite other people over for dinner. Yeah, I wonder. Because I grapple with it too. And I'm always like, well, we shouldn't send the invite out because we sent it out last time. like What kind of dinner party is this going to be? like How intentional do I get to be? Because like I don't want to be over the top. I don't want to have everything set. And people are like, I thought we were coming over for pizza. like There's just so much self judgment that exists in that space. And I think the like
00:21:49
Speaker
18 year old us who is so ready to even if we grew up in homes that we loved, we're ready to break out and like, be on fire, right? We're like, we want to live, we want to do it better, we want to discover we want to like, that I feel like as we get into our 30s and realize, oh, we're not going to be as important as we thought we were. Right.
00:22:09
Speaker
can snuff out all our creativity. yes Because it's like, I'm just going to get real small. like I'm just going to stick with the court the nuclear family, and we're just going to do the stuff. And it's like, we lose these opportunities to play, and to create, to risk. It still matters. like And yes can we hold that and recognize you didn't have to end up famous, or you didn't have to change something massive,
00:22:38
Speaker
for your voice to matter, for your your unique spin of play to matter. Yes, like each person at every fire has a role to play and matters in terms of the depth and the goodness of that.
00:22:52
Speaker
fire plate, that that fire pit. And you're still a great storyteller. Even if everybody like went to bed that night or bailed on you, like yes they've got their own stuff going on. Yes. I have this music musician friend who's who's really, ah you know he's an incredible musician, and but he's never made it big. right and He's made albums and he's had moments where he's played stages and it's been really amazing. and he's He's now having to kind of grapple with like But we have this beautiful community when we all get together. It's like, we want to hear him play. We use his music. We we want to engage with him. he'll He'll help us write music when we have ideas about it, right? It's like really sweet and lovely. And he has a studio that we're all invited to to help to be in and and do. and And so much of his his life has been grappling with the fact that, like, does it still matter if it's not big? Yeah.
00:23:45
Speaker
Does it still matter if this is, you know, and what does he do with his own sense of accomplishment or or disappointment? You know, and I think if if we're not, if we don't see creativity and suffering as hand in hand, like the like then then as soon as the suffering part of it comes, we're going to shut down the creativity because we think it's marking the fact that maybe the creativity isn't meant to be versus the fact that it's impossible to really risk and not get rejected, you know, not get critique, not feel less than not, you know, have people just not want to come over for dinner, it you know, and, it and it's like, how do you, how do you keep moving knowing that suffering is just, it's, it's part of it. It's the grist for the mill. It's the other side of the coin and it's hard, but it doesn't mean to back down yeah or, or to stop creating.
00:24:41
Speaker
But it, you know, but it is something to grapple with. Like I, you know, I've spent a lot of my 20, 20s and 30s creating a lot of big organizations, content, material, theories, blah, blah, blah, and into my forties. Right. And there's this sense of like, Oh, this is so fun to keep creating. But then when, when you, when you, when you take the fall.
00:25:03
Speaker
which is inevitable, right? there's There's the tumbling down of like, oh, this isn't going as well, or this is falling apart, or I've had massive failures and now your your role in the organization changes. Like this happens all the time with with leaders, pastors, creatives, anyone who's kind of putting themselves out there, there's this inevitable drop that happens where you realize creative, like building this, birthing these things, suffering is actually inevitable.
00:25:29
Speaker
Yeah. and you You will suffer to create. You will suffer to live a good life. You will be rejected. You will have you know humiliation and heartache and pain that's associated with it because there's a lot that gets stirred up for people around creativity, right? you know Because as soon as you create something, everyone's like, ooh, that's awesome. But there's also envy underneath it of like, ooh, why didn't I think of that, right?
00:25:57
Speaker
Or even you know the book that is sitting in herself, as soon as you put it out there, then then you deal with the editors that are either saying yes or no, or the acquisition people who are like, yeah, this is a great book, or sorry, you know we're not going to publish. like As soon as you put things out there you know in the midst of the creative process, then then you're opening yourself up.
00:26:18
Speaker
to to the critique um and both good and bad. you You get the accolades and you also get the rejection and all of it comes with that. But I, you know, I'm like, what is then the call? Yeah. In the midst of it, if we know it's inevitable, if we know we can't avoid the suffering, will you still create anyways? Yeah. It's it like I'm hearing, you know, as I sat with this prompt as like creativity, some of the best creativity is often birthed of suffering. Yes.
00:26:47
Speaker
And as I'm sitting with you, it's like, and to create demands there, and maybe this is just because like the world, the world is a fallen freight place. So to ever birth comes with pain, right? Like, and the, the natural unfolding of that, and it could be any number of things like.
00:27:12
Speaker
It is signing up just like love is signing up for loss, like precious things, things that we love. yeah There is a tenuousness, a precarity, a temporalness there that we're going to feel. Yeah. Yeah. I think it's interesting that that you, your creativity, like your books that you're talking about were a bird out of pain, heartache, trying to make sense of loss, trying to make sense of what happened to you. And it, and it puts you into a creative mode. and For me, a lot of my my creativity is the thing that brought suffering, like my willingness to create, to dream, to say, yeah, let's do it, or I think I can do it, or I think we can do it. you know let's Let's go for it. right For me, that's what brought me into to suffering. And I think to even see the the flow of that, the wave of that, that whether it's before or after, right um they're they're still deeply intermingled and connected to one another.
00:28:10
Speaker
yeah Yeah, it's making me think, like, as you were talking about your friend who has never been famous, yeah is highly creative and artistic. Aaron and I were sitting having dinner the other night and he played an old band, a band from college. He he was in a band in college.
00:28:29
Speaker
Um, and, and kind of on that edge of like, he was making lots of music and knew he didn't want that to be his life. But this band, they have a beautiful album. They were local to Kalamazoo. They never made it big, but he's like, this album changed my life. Like it was so deep and I think about like the famous the famous creatives. I don't know about you, but like as I experience their work, typically today I experience a sense of loss, of like what i what was so human about you, what I so deeply attached to.
00:29:04
Speaker
was what was small and vulnerable and suffering that you were speaking out into the world that I was like, me too. And like, as you've grown on this stage, like your perspective has changed. you Like in some ways you've lost some of that creative fire, right? Because you're further away from the raw, vulnerable, suffering heart of it. Right. Right. Well, and then, and then the work is to stay on the top. Yeah.
00:29:31
Speaker
Right. Which is about something very different. Very different. Right. Yeah. Yeah. Well, and and I think, you know, if if we do go back to the idea that we're all meant to contribute in some way, right, and knowing that part of how we get to contribute. Like for you, you contributed. I mean, you've contributed in lots of ways, but but one is by recognizing what it's felt like to have heartbreak and and the normal things of life and being willing to put it to paper, to give it language, to to birth it in different way, or the work that you've done there on the podcast and red tent living and, you know, at least like you're, you're meeting a need because that you had this sense of their suffering.
Creating Healing Spaces
00:30:12
Speaker
There are people who may be feeling the same thing that I'm feeling, and so maybe it would be helpful for them to have a place to land, where they can learn from each other, where we can be honest, where we can share stories, right? Like it's a beautiful act of creativity. That again goes back to your fire analogy of you're you're just gathering people and saying, you know, me too, and let's like share our humanness together. You know, so much of your creativity has come from seeing. What about you?
00:30:42
Speaker
knowing what creativity costs, knowing that you've played it out in big spaces that have hurt a lot. air Where's your creative fire most kindled right now in what you're about each day? and I think you know the way that I've created is that selfishly, I think I create based on what I what i need.
00:31:06
Speaker
That's got to be all of us, right? I think so, but it sounded terrible coming out. I don't think so. I just think it's true. It's just human. It's just human. So it's like, I feel like whenever I feel a gap or I see a gap, I'm like, oh, I think I can maybe do something about that.
00:31:23
Speaker
And that's, that's a, you know, that's a lovely generative part of me. And so right now I, I, I see gaps places. And for me, a lot of the gap is creating a space for women in particular to become the wild, grounded healers that were meant to be.
00:31:42
Speaker
naturally in the world. And not to say that men don't have that too. they They do, but I specifically have been working a lot with women lately and and being like, wow, there's so much in mythology and story and fairy tales in scripture that show us something of the feminine heart of God that's been lost in the world. And because we've gone after the masculine energy of God and not understood more of this balance. um And in that sense that Gertrude Miller Nelson, who's an author that I've loved, she's I think in her 90s now living in California, but she's a brilliant woman. And she writes a lot about the the intersection of psychology, Jungian psychology and theology and fairy tales. And I've just, I mean, she's changed my life, but she talks a lot about the loss of the of the um the mystic poetic church. And we've lost our way in terms of connecting to the rhythms of the earth, the rhythms of liturgical calendar, the rhythms of the feasting of the table of our capacity to connect to one another. and that it's it's really made us lose ourselves and our natural connection to the earth, our natural connection to each other, our natural connection to our bodies, our natural connection to God, and that there's a lot of interference happening where but we're having a very difficult time connecting to that.
00:32:55
Speaker
Christianity ends up being this dogmatic, you know, idealism that is just very, very damaging to the creativity in human psyche. And so I found myself in the intersection, like feeling very excited about it and wanting to introduce women into pilgrimages of of taking them to different countries or different landscapes and and allowing them to connect to different wilds, archetypes of of myths. you know we I look at the fairy tales of the Handless Maiden and Snow White and Cinderella and Hansel and Gretel and the scripture narratives that are you know wild around Elizabeth. and Your mom and I have done a lot of this work together in our Sacred Interruption retreats. but
00:33:36
Speaker
That's, those are the parts where for me, the creativity is like, what's, what's been dormant and, and kind of light light fallow for a while that's ready to burst from the earth again. And so I find myself being kind of like, like a farmer of like, okay, you know, what, what's, what soil has been left alone for that, that we really need.
00:34:02
Speaker
what it's gonna offer the earth and and how can I go and cultivate that again and be part of this movement. And so I like the the kind of quiet energy of God that's in the corners and waiting for someone to kind of come along and be like, what if, is there something here? Like what did this space used to be? And what sort of crop needs to be planted here? What is what do we need to to cultivate? It's a super long answer to. Yeah.
00:34:30
Speaker
and i I love that you've sort of recognized and leaned into it's, it's some like core myths and truths. It's some core creativity that you're harkening back to where it's like, can I reattach? Can I help others reattach to these like grounding stories? Yeah. Yeah. And rituals that have kept us grounded, but we've kind of stepped away from and then wondered why we're so anxious.
00:35:00
Speaker
Yeah. We have no center. No. Yeah. And and there's so much loss of you know center of community center. We don't have the village anymore. We don't have people to attach to. We don't have our own little fire that we're meeting with and and sharing life with. and And so how do we reestablish that and reconnect people to what is actually available to us and always has been. It's nothing new, right? It's the ancient art of of mysticism and the and the poetic church that is just waiting for us to find find
Living Grounded Lives
00:35:30
Speaker
it again. and And I'm not the first. like There are people who have come before me. it I just am intrigued by the whole thing and want to join yeah the people who are already talking about this. And then being able to help you know connect the group the people that I've been working with over the last 20 years around story work and
00:35:49
Speaker
um and the work that I do in the world and help connect them to this centering force that actually helps them live a centered, grounded, faithful life where the ordinary is beautiful and they contend to it and they they can feel settled in their own bodies and feel really good about the life that they're living. Even if, you know, we're just talking to a friend this morning and I was like, You know, at this point, if my life gets too chaotic, I'm just quitting everything and becoming a priest at Starbucks because at least I'll be settled and happy.
00:36:19
Speaker
Like I'm unwilling to be frazzled and anxious, right? it's That's not a way that I'm willing to live anymore. And and so, you know, to to reorient our lives to actually being able to to to create, to to dream, to live settled, ordinary lives and to look around us and say, you know, who are we meant to be with and help heal? That's that's already available to us and that our our role is to tend.
00:36:48
Speaker
to them. So that, that's what gets me excited, you know, and I, as soon as I get excited about stuff, then I start to create and dream. And so that's where it flows out of you. Well, I mean, I just, I i can't, i I guess I could help it if I tried, but why would I?
00:37:04
Speaker
Yeah, as i as we like close this and as I think about what I'm walking forward with, like I want want to be engaging my creativity and my creative energy daily with like not for the sake of myself, but like for for the sake of my fire, like for the sake of the people around me. right like yeah Bringing it and receiving it. right like That's the other thing, not being so hyper focused on the tasks that I'm missing the moment to bless so-and-so's creativity at the table. right like yes Because that's generative too. yeah that That feels like a good space to till and to be intentional about.
00:37:49
Speaker
Yeah, I love that. I love that. I know that my when I think about creativity, I always think about what I'm creating, but I love the fact that you're bringing it back to how are we receiving what other people are wanting to create on our behalf as well? And how do we sit at their fires, at their tables, and be blessed by their music?
00:38:11
Speaker
or their storytelling, or their food, and are we willing to to live a life? like as soon as As soon as you realize how much it risky it all is, like we said earlier, it's easy to shut it down and then stop.
Embracing Creative Risks
00:38:26
Speaker
Right. And I think one of the most radical acts of faith, of tending is when we we realize suffering is going to happen. Like this is going to hurt. I won't belabor the story, but your mom and I, when we were talking about whether we were going to do the sacred interruption retreats, which we do a couple of times a year. And it's been a really sweet space for us, all of us to create and to to build and to think about new ways of talking about God. It's been a real gift you know and we've all been burned.
00:38:53
Speaker
And so, you know, you put a bunch of women who have all created and then been burned by their creativity or or the spaces, and then we're we're looking at each other and going, well, the we're you're going to end up being someone who hurts me in like 10 years when this all goes to hell, right? And that's the cynical part, right? But it's it's like, you know, the idealism of watching someone get married. We were like, yeah, you know, say your vows, but talk to me after you have your first massive fight and you don't want to go home.
00:39:22
Speaker
There's something about like go staying in the game really matters, especially after you realize how house how um South it can go. I was thinking of marriage as you i and I was thinking of, I have a friend who post COVID, I think the the best, the kindest way to say it is she stopped throwing parties and I miss her. Yeah, yeah.
00:39:48
Speaker
And we still, you know, we grab up breakfast once a month, but it's like this huge relational loss. And like, I could make it ugly. I could say like, you don't care about me like you did. Like I could charge it with all the, or I could just say like, okay, a fire's been snuffed out. And like, how do we, how do we tend and how, how do I keep creating and showing up and hoping she'll come back someday? Totally. Right. And the more we can deal with the suffering side of it and and the more, you know, so now that we've all gone through seasons where, you know,
00:40:22
Speaker
we've We've had terrible loss in and destruction and you know like just massive heartache around what we've created. To create again in the face of it and then say, I know what could be, but i'm I'm willing to try it again because the gift of creating is so good and it's what we're meant for. I actually believe now that I can go through the life-death-life cycle.
00:40:48
Speaker
and and that that is just inevitable and part ah part of it. But if we're not okay with the death part of it, we will not create, not really. what We'll always hold a little bit of ourselves back. We can stop living just so we don't have to die. Totally. yeah Yes.
00:41:04
Speaker
Yeah. So like the, the idea that are we willing to reckon with what it will cost us knowing that, that the gift is bigger than, than the cost and you know, the life death life cycle ah psychically won't actually kill us. I mean, it could, but you know, what are you going to do? Not create? Yeah. How awful. Yeah. That's really good.
00:41:30
Speaker
Thank you for sharing and opening up this conversation. I love where you led it and what you brought and how you engaged me. Yeah, Katie, it was really good to be with you. Good to be with you too. Yeah, thanks.
Closing Credits
00:41:45
Speaker
The Red Tent Living podcast is produced by myself, Katie Stafford, and edited by Aaron Stafford. Our cover art is designed by Libby Johnson, and all our guests are part of the Red Tent Living community.
00:41:59
Speaker
You can find us all at redtentliving.com, as well as on Facebook and Instagram. If you love the stories shared here, we would be thrilled if you left us a review. Until next week, love to you, dear ones.