The conformity box

As adults we so quickly fall into training babies and children to be adults. I think though that they have so much to teach us if we let them.

Conformity can begin from birth in our culture. There are many benefits. Conformity gives us rules and guidelines on how should dress, behave, speak and how not to dress, behave and speak. When it works well, conformity looks neat and tidy. So all in all conformity works right?

Maybe there is a home for it somewhere, but I haven't found it to be effective in my own existence as yet. If we don't fit into the neat tidy box of conformity (which we all experience at various points in our life if not every day!) we are considered to be weird, different, a loner, misbehaved, too quiet, too loud, mentally ill or essentially not good enough. If we do fit into the box, we spend every day putting all of our energy into keeping our place in the box. I have so many concerns on how this affects us through youth and adulthood.

I'm not gonna lie. I step into conformity myself. Sometimes I wish people would be just like me, I wish people or children would do what I tell them to and then other times I try to squeeze myself into the right type of clothes, the right groups of people and try to be the cool, calm, outgoing, in control person. These are the days I feel powerless and small no matter how successful I am at getting myself or others into that box. I believe that conformity breeds anxiety, stress, anger, depression, fear, self-hate, shame and possibly much more.

The days that I feel my best are the days that I let myself learn from the people and events in my life and surrender myself to not knowing (turns out I can't read minds or the future), creativity, play, curiosity and the gap in life. I didn't learn that from my family or my school education...I first learnt it through music, art and dance...and try to practice it in the way I play, rest and work :)

Where does conformity fit for you?

Creativity - a missing link in mental health?

One thing that I always notice in my work - is that adults are often afraid to make music or sometimes engage in music therapy because they might get it wrong. Why? I mean as children we're always trying something new - making up our own games - unafraid. But something happens and we lose that courage to just have a go. Our education system is set up for us to get jobs and that there is a right way and a wrong way. So you either keep trying till you get it right or you get it wrong and then give up - or not try at all - cos if you don't try at least you don't have the chance for failure.

So who decides what's right and what's wrong? When we come into adulthood and discover that there are no rules for sustaining or forming relationships - there's no rules on creating the lives that we want - no guidelines on being human - no rules on expressing our authentic selves - we start to get a little lost...possibly because we have not been taught to create without borders.

I believe that creativity in education is essential - and it is missing in the way the learn as children, young people and adults. Without creativity we become afraid of what could go wrong instead of thinking of the wrongs as being part of the process. I also wonder whether there is a link between the way we educate - and the cognitive distortions we take on?

I also believe that creativity in mental health recovery is essential. Creativity develops many life skills:

• The ability to see one situation from many perspectives
• The ability to feel emotions and express oneself authentically
• The ability to make connections
• The ability to engage in the present moment or understand the past
• The desire to make change and try something new
• The ability to withhold judgment (from the self and others)
• and I'm sure many more...

Need any more excuses to get your creative on?