Mental, Emotional, & Creative Health with T. Thorn Coyle

In this solo episode, author T. Thorn Coyle reflects on the intersection of mental health, creativity, and spiritual practice during challenging times.They discuss the importance of creativity as a form of rebellion, and the necessity of maintaining mental and physical health. Thorn emphasizes the need for community support and the role of spiritual practices in fostering resilience and hope.

This podcast is supported on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/c/ThornCoyle

Transcript

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Hello there, it's T. Thorn Coyle here with another episode of Magic, Creativity, and Life. This will be a short episode today. It's a solo show because I've just been pondering some things. But first, in some personal updates, I am still working on Bookish Baddies, which is book six of the Pride Street. Cozy corgi paranormal mysteries. Still having fun with that and I am still setting up. my Kickstarter for the upcoming Evolutionary Witchcraft and Stars of Power campaign. I'm working with a specialty printer on some fabulous deluxe editions of Evolutionary Witchcraft, the 20th anniversary revised edition. So that's going to be really cool and I hope to have a proof copy to show off before the campaign launches. Other than that, just going for walks, taking care of business, doing all that sort of thing. So let's dive in. What I've been thinking about lately is mental health and creativity and spiritual practice during these times. I've been talking with a lot of creative friends, writers, musicians, artists, dancers, and just folks who are generally creative, know, bakers, people like that, and everyone's struggling. And I'm sure those of you who don't feel you're creative, even though I would probably argue that you are in some form or fashion, I bet you're probably struggling too. I think anyone who isn't struggling right now with mental and emotional health, maybe those people aren't paying very close attention or perhaps they enjoy the way things are going in the world right now and are reaping rewards from that. Those are not the people I tend to hang out with. As a matter of fact, I, in recent years have distanced myself more and more from those people. I used to try to be in dialogue with them. Discovered that really we were having conversations on completely different planes. It would have taken 30 years of re-education to even open the door to a fruitful conversation. So I finally backed away from that work and decided to focus on working with like-minded people or people who were in need or people that I don't even necessarily agree with on everything, but who aren't combatively bigoted or aren't combatively racist or misogynist or anti-immigrant or homophobic or transphobic. people who still have some room for growth, room to change our thinking, right? Just like I still have to educate myself and change my thinking. It's one thing I learned in going over the revised edition for Evolutionary Witchcraft. You know, I wrote that over 20 years ago now, and I went through it page by page. And in doing so, I realized the ways in which I've changed over 20 years, which is as it should be. I should change. My view of the world has shifted and expanded. The way I think about some things has shifted and expanded. I have been educated by people younger than myself, which has been really helpful. You know, I know our culture tends to not respect. elders, that is true, but elders also tend to not respect youth. And I try to learn from the entire spectrum of age. I try to learn from different cultures, people from different backgrounds, right? So it was great to see the ways in which I have shifted that feel healthy and nurturing to me. I felt similarly in writing Stars of Power because I've been working with those tools, the Pentacles, for 40 years. And I had thought at one point, you know, I'm not working them diligently the way I used to. Do I have something to say about these tools? And in writing that book, I went, my gosh, I've integrated that work so deeply that it has changed me. And therefore my relationship with that work feels really rich now in ways that it didn't back when I was still learning the tools and working them all the time. So perspective has been great for me. And when times feel acute, when things feel like they're crumbling so rapidly, we can't even keep up, which I was telling to, a digital nomad friend of mine who lives all over the world is originally from France and said to me just today, I hope my comment about this social media platform wasn't offensive. I had no idea how bad things were. And I said, I can't expect you to know. Things are changing at a rapid clip right now. things are changing far more rapidly than we expected. Things that I expected to take six months to shake out took one month. Things that should have taken three years are taking six months or less. Everything is on an accelerationist path right now, or at least that's how it feels to me. That's how it feels to my psychic body, my emotional body, and my physical body as well, right? So looping that back to creativity. There are people who say we need creativity now more than ever. I say that. That is one of my catchphrases that I use over and over again. And I believe it's true. We need creativity because we need hope. We need creativity because we need a vision of the world that is kinder, more beautiful, and more just. We need a vision of the world that is post-scarcity. We need a vision of the world not run by greed and fear and anger. And so we do need creativity, but that doesn't mean it's easy to create when times feel oppressive and hard. And yet people from oppressed communities have always found ways to create because they had to. The oppression was ongoing. It wasn't a spike like many of us are feeling right now, right? It was just a fact of life. So you raised your children, you planted your garden, you baked your bread, you painted your painting, you wrote your poem, you danced with your friends, you made music. And I've written about this in the past too. How creativity in itself becomes a rebellion, the more oppressive life gets, the more outside forces want to keep people down. You know, Rai music in Algeria is one prime example in the 1980s when there were, authoritarian crackdowns and people would still get together, play music and dance. And the music was all about celebration and having a good time, which was counter to what the regime at that time wanted for people, right? So art has always been form of rebellion. I think also of Victor Jara, one of the martyrs in Chile who was, tortured and killed when the CIA helped overthrow the government in Chile in the 70s. And he never stopped singing. He never stopped writing songs for the people until the very end. Some of my favorite artists I was just privileged to see dissident Chinese artist Ai Weiwei, his exhibit at the Seattle Art Museum. And his work is so powerful. I've been trying to write about it and I'm still wrestling with this essay. His creation is so heart-filled and it's so filled with rage and presence and his love for ordinary people, his love for children, for workers. And, you know, he, his life has been really hard because of it, but he hasn't given up. He never has given up, even when he was under house arrest, even when he was in actual prison. And that all gives me hope. Now, I go through phases where I think, am I strong enough? Am I resilient enough? And some days I'm not. Some days the answer is I'm tired. Some days the answer is I don't have the capacity to deal with that today. And what do I do on those days? I often escape into art or I escape into beauty in some form, usually in the natural world, just walking through the city, right? Noticing the birds and the insects and the flowers and the trees, noticing the change of the seasons. All of that reconnects me to the creative impulse as well. So For our mental health right now, doing what we can, A, to help each other, that's important. I always am helped by being able to do something, right? So I can give my books to this fundraiser that's gonna support World Central Kitchen and Gaza Soup Kitchen. I can make a new t-shirt that the profits are going to go to Nerds for Literacy. I can help people in my local community. who are fighting oppression or feeding people, right? That helps my mental health. Committing to my physical body well-being also helps my mental and emotional health, right? Making sure I go for a walk every day, doing some resistance training, even if it's not very much, helps me, right? And part of what helps me is not just the exercise, because of course exercise helps our mental and emotional health, but it's also helpful to say, Damn it, I am determined to be as strong and healthy as I can be, even when I don't have a lot of energy right now to exercise. I am not doing huge workouts. I'm doing bits and pieces. And that's enough to keep me going, right? And it's the same with creativity. I am determined to continue to create, no matter how difficult. conditions feel or become. What does this look like for me? Right now I'm writing every day, along with running my business, designing books, all of that sort of thing. And I'm not actually having trouble creating overall, except I've had insomnia lately. Insomnia makes my brain tired. When my brain is tired, it's hard for me to do generative work. So some days my writing sessions are very short. They're brief. I'm not writing thousands of words at a time. There are days when I can get in the flow. I can hit my preferred word count. There are other days where I show up and I write and I say, that's good enough. because my creativity is important. I am not letting anyone take that away from me. So how's your mental and emotional health? How's your spiritual practice right now? That's the other thing. I'm doing spiritual practice every day. I'm saying prayers, I'm lighting candles, I'm meditating. Am I meditating for 40 minutes at a time? No. My brain is a little too scattered, but I'm centering. I'm breathing. I'm building in quiet time every morning and every evening. Some days, I have more energy and attention for it, some days less, that's okay. So I'm both recommitting and giving myself grace. And that also feels important right now. So what are you doing for your spiritual health, your physical health, your mental and emotional health, and your creativity? How are you refilling the well, as Julia Cameron would say? I'm wondering also if having one of my colleagues on to talk about mental health in these times would be of use or interest to you. So if that is of interest, please let me know, send me a comment or comment on YouTube or on my blog anywhere and let me know. And I think that's all I have to say on the topic today. So let's take a breath together. and let your attention drop. on your exhalation and find your center, that place between your navel and your pelvis. And just breathe into that for a moment. And remember one good thing about being alive today. And as always, thanks for joining me. This is Magic, Creativity, and Life. And I give a special thanks to my Patreon supporters who make this podcast possible. Have a magical, creative day.