Blog

From depression to creativity

In this episode I share the article ‘From Depression to Creativity’, that I have written in 2018 for the Dutch magazine ‘The Optimist’

The article ‘From Depression to Creativity’ I wrote after I had published my book ‘Depression, a Stepping-stone towards Bliss’.

I have translated the article in English and will read it to you.

It has taken me forty years to struggle through the gray tunnel of depression in order to see my creativity blossom at the end. In hindsight, I didn't have to do anything more than get closer to myself.

My spiritual master Osho says: “Creativity isn't something you do. You allow the universal power to work through you. You just become a medium. You give your hands, your body, your heart, your 'being' to existence and then existence sings a song and becomes eternal, as eternal as existence itself. That's just creativity. I can't imagine anything creative other than this."

The Eastern mystic also calls depression a sign of intelligence. No longer wanting to move with the masses, who move in a neurotic way in the direction of ambitions, the latest fashion, the most beautiful holiday destinations and a successful life, acting according to the prevailing norms and values.

Sometimes you lack the courage to wrestle yourself out of the old patterns. What does it take now in the depression to open up to this universal force? For example, I had to take my child position again. That was not necessarily easy. I had to give up my ego, in which I had invested a lot by wanting to take care of my mother emotionally. I describe things that have helped me.

Unsupported block (bulleted_list_item)

Doctor and psychiatrist Dr. David Servan Schreiber writes very clearly about this in his book 'Your brain as Medicine'. This limbic system is in close contact with the body. Anything that activates or moves the body (exercise, body-oriented therapy, acupuncture, tai chi, qi gong, yoga) brings the limbic part of the brain to life. In depression, every movement is blocked, both mentally and physically.

The handbrake that is unconsciously pulled tight keeps the emotional brain trapped in a much too tight straitjacket and makes the emotional connection with the self and the environment impossible. Everything is drab, flat and gray, without any view of creativity. There is a reason for maintaining this brake. Unconsciously, the soul stops us, to urge us to meet the deepest and darkest negative sides in ourselves and to transform them into light. Deep down we can no longer unite with the old way of life and long for a new way of being.

Osho's active meditations help to break free from old entrenched patterns. By starting with movement, suppressed emotions can be released in preparation of connecting with the inner core. Emotions such as anger and sadness are often hidden under the depression. When these are acknowledged and expressed, the liveliness starts flowing again. The flat grayness of the depression then gives way to the fire of anger or the softness and depth of the tears.

The spontaneous movements that can be made during Osho meditations are creative expressions in themselves. Think of a dance that arises out of nowhere, or the wild movements of arms and legs while expressing anger in the Osho Dynamic Meditation, about which more information can be found at the website www.enjoyingmeditation.com.

Unsupported block (bulleted_list_item)

But what is the relationship between contact with our mother and creativity? Our mother is our source of life. She carried us in her body and brought us to earth. Then she fed us, clothed us and loved us. She has given us the greatest gift: 'life'. And only from connection with this life can creativity arise.

In addition to being the giver of our lives, our mother is also often a source of frustration. In contact with her we incur our deepest pain, when the desire for her closeness is not fulfilled. When she leaves us, even if only to do her own thing, it can be unbearable. We then often bite into what we have not received in the hope of receiving it, seeing everything that happens later in contact with her in relation to the pain previously experienced. We close ourselves off from her to protect ourselves from another rejection. However, this closing off also prevents us from being able to receive from her any longer and with this we also block our creativity.

There is another way to prevent ourselves (albeit unconsciously) from receiving from our mother, and that is if we started to care for our mother emotionally or physically as a child. This often makes us feel very powerful and important and in fact it gives us strength. But it also means that we can no longer be a child and that we can therefore not receive from our mother. We will then be left empty.

This is the emptiness of the depression. From this void, creativity is impossible. We can - and I say this from personal experience - still become a child of our mother (which is also possible if she is no longer alive). What is then necessary is to give up the ego. After all, a lot has been invested in taking care of her and it has become part of the identity. But when there is the willingness to give it up, all the good she has given can still be received and what belongs to her will be left with her then. I have been able to experience all this through family constellations. It has given me back my life.

Unsupported block (bulleted_list_item)

My creative therapist then suggested that I, without thinking about work, would start collecting pictures that appealed to me to make a collage of them. That appealed to me, because then I didn't have to use my brain, which had been tormented by worrying a lot. I picked up a stack of old magazines and started. And sure enough: while I could hardly make choices during my depression, I now suddenly knew which pictures appealed to me and which did not.

I sorted the pictures and pasted them on four large green sheets of paper: the first with people completely absorbed in what they were doing, the second with a desk with an alarm clock on it (I wanted to be occupied) and a fence that was wide open (I longed to receive people), the third with people meditating in various places in nature and the fourth with people meditating in different places, such as in a moving train or in a garden under the starry sky. The sheets spoke to me and my heart opened.

I felt that I did know what I wanted deep inside and my creativity flowed through my heart, my arms, the scissors and the glue pot to my collages, precisely because now I was not thinking and only connected with what moved me from within .

Shortly afterwards, one of my fellow group members suggested making a focus stone out of soapstone: a symbol that helped me focus on what I wanted. When I had cut a beautiful sparkling stone and placed it on the table in front of me, I suddenly felt what I wanted: to follow Meera's Art Therapy Training. In that training I rediscovered my life through painting, the active Osho meditations and family constellations. The three elements all work outside the head and establish a direct contact with the well-being, the soul and the emotional life that often functions at a very low level in depression.

So it is possible to go from depression to creativity. Everything which brings you to your being (beyond your thinking) helps with that. If our being is not inhibited by anything, it wants to move, create. Conversely, creativity has helped me get out of my depressions. After having been depressed for so many years, I enjoy my creativity even more, because I know what it's like to be stuck in the void. Or as Osho puts it: 'The deeper the valley, the higher the peak'.

Out of gratitude, and to offer others who struggle with depression more tools to come out of depression with awareness and without medication, I have written a book. This was published in September 2018: ‘Depression, a Stepping-stone towards Bliss’ and an online course: 'Beyond Depression with Consciousness'.

For more information you can look at my website:

Klik hier om de link te openen