Embrace Your Limitations to become free of them
I hear it often. Someone tells me the reasons (limits) why they can’t try something new or jump into exploring a passion. Any limitation we give ourselves can be rationalized completely and keep you moving on the same old familiar path you have always traveled. There is nothing wrong with that if you are happy on your journey. BUT WHAT IF you are not? WHAT IF YOU CHOOSE to embrace a limitation and explore it. Artist Phil Hansen did exactly that. He gave up on his art once he had developed shaking in his hands preventing him from creating art the way he had done for most of his life. He missed the art so much that he decided to visit a neurologist who diagnosed a neurological impairment. The neurologist simply said “why don’t you embrace the shake”?
This surprising statement spurred Phil Hansen into an amazing exploration and creative journey learning how to embrace this limitation and move beyond it. Many new avenues of creating art opened up to him as he explored beyond the shaking. Besides being a successful artist he has become a sought after speaker inspiring people with his story
Sometimes a limitation is a physical thing like Phil had with his hands but the true limitation was in how he originally thought about this limitation. It was actually in his head where most of our limitations lie. One of the amazing things that Phil did with his exploration is he began to ask himself questions about how he could make art differently resulting in unique creative explorations.
I have had a similar experience with my musical journey. As a young child I had a very unpleasant experience with my piano teacher. After two years of lessons he finally figured out that I was not reading the music but playing by ear and watching what he was doing. It was easy for me to do that and seemed pointless to read music. Unfortunately he began to tell me loudly over and over that I could not make music that way and had to read the notes. In my eight year old brain, this didn’t seem right because I was playing the music. Eventually I gave up, quitting piano and never really trying to play anything until I was given a Native American Flute at 52 years of age. I owned a limitation provided to me by this music teacher for over 40 years. Once that flute was in my hand, it set me free of that limitation. I discovered that there are many ways to connect to the joyful experience of creating music and my musical exploration continues.
Limitations seem like an unusual place to harness your creative spirit but once you challenge yourself to embrace the limitation, learning to be creative within the confines of a limitations can change your life. In fact you may even become grateful for a limitation as you travel in vastly different directions than you might have if that limitation had not been in your life. I know I have. I still don’t read music but have learned to move beyond that and connect to my own musical nature and spread my musical wings.
Terry Mack
Creative Living Catalyst and Coach
Phone: 250-740-0473
www.livinglifecreatively.com
This surprising statement spurred Phil Hansen into an amazing exploration and creative journey learning how to embrace this limitation and move beyond it. Many new avenues of creating art opened up to him as he explored beyond the shaking. Besides being a successful artist he has become a sought after speaker inspiring people with his story
Sometimes a limitation is a physical thing like Phil had with his hands but the true limitation was in how he originally thought about this limitation. It was actually in his head where most of our limitations lie. One of the amazing things that Phil did with his exploration is he began to ask himself questions about how he could make art differently resulting in unique creative explorations.
I have had a similar experience with my musical journey. As a young child I had a very unpleasant experience with my piano teacher. After two years of lessons he finally figured out that I was not reading the music but playing by ear and watching what he was doing. It was easy for me to do that and seemed pointless to read music. Unfortunately he began to tell me loudly over and over that I could not make music that way and had to read the notes. In my eight year old brain, this didn’t seem right because I was playing the music. Eventually I gave up, quitting piano and never really trying to play anything until I was given a Native American Flute at 52 years of age. I owned a limitation provided to me by this music teacher for over 40 years. Once that flute was in my hand, it set me free of that limitation. I discovered that there are many ways to connect to the joyful experience of creating music and my musical exploration continues.
Limitations seem like an unusual place to harness your creative spirit but once you challenge yourself to embrace the limitation, learning to be creative within the confines of a limitations can change your life. In fact you may even become grateful for a limitation as you travel in vastly different directions than you might have if that limitation had not been in your life. I know I have. I still don’t read music but have learned to move beyond that and connect to my own musical nature and spread my musical wings.
Terry Mack
Creative Living Catalyst and Coach
Phone: 250-740-0473
www.livinglifecreatively.com
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