First, let me invite you to take a look at my latest book, Redesign Your Mind. I think it might serve you beautifully!

Now, on to this week’s post.

The majority of people who have suffered adverse childhood experiences, like bullying, physical violence, neglect, sexual assault, and other traumatic events, retain as one consequence lifelong problems with trust. But even for those individuals spared a traumatic childhood, trust is likely an issue, as the world (and people) give us many reasons not to be overly trusting. What can help foster trust? In today’s post called “How Creativity Fosters Deep Trust,” creativity coach Gaia Orion argues that creating has that power, the power to foster trust.

Gaia explained:

The year I turned 24, my life changed dramatically. In only three months I gave birth to my first child, I got married, I graduated as an architect and I moved from my bustling student life in Paris to full-time motherhood in the countryside in Canada.

This transition required an enormous trust in myself for making the right choices; trust in others like my husband and my new country; and trust in life because I really had no idea what I was doing!

Eventually this series of choices led me to an incredibly creative life.

Today I reflect how the process works just as well the other way around: creativity has the power to lead us to deepen trust in ourselves, in others and even in life.
Inviting creativity will benefit anyone. It particularly develops our skills around four specific areas which are relevant to our times:

+ Embracing the unknown

+ Strengthening Intuition

+ Experiencing deep trust

+ Gaining insight

I created an exercise to harness your creativity and develop these four areas. You will want to do this exercise with at least one other person since the theme of trust explores our relational skills.

Embracing the Unknown: Take a blank sheet of paper and let the pen draw what it wants to. Can you watch it move across the paper without worrying about the outcome? A simple exercise like this may reveal your habitual tendencies when in front of new circumstances. For many adults, the idea of drawing can cause a certain amount of insecurity and contraction which can turn into an attempt to control what could be effortless flow.

Strengthening Intuition: Continue to spontaneously draw and add colors if you wish: you are now opening the gate to the wide space of potential; you are connecting with the infinite possibilities of expression. You are tapping into the realm of feeling where all ideas and innovation arise from. The tool of creativity awakens our natural childlike imagination, play and curiosity.

Experiencing Deep Trust: Now show your drawings to each other. Can you feel how this requires a certain amount of vulnerability and openness? In this reciprocal situation, you will learn from each other and you will get closer in sharing about what you think and feel when looking at the art that has been produced. The feeling of bonding and trust emerges naturally from these kinds of discussions.

Gaining Insight: Let the words from the conversation resonate and then look at your drawing again. This activates your prefrontal cortex which is always looking for patterns and connections with other bits of existing information. With purposeful attention, you can extract meaning out of the random lines, shapes and colors. This allows insights to arise. This kind of exercise can help us know ourselves better but also facilitates the arising of solutions for problems that were impossible to resolve by over-thinking.

Whether it is with the people we love or at the workplace, developing deep trust creates a rich, fulfilling and purposeful life and creativity can be your guide.
Google came up with a similar conclusion around the theme of our need for deep trust to flourish. It spent two years studying a hundred and eighty teams and found that ‘psychological safety’ was one of the most important factors for the success of teams.

Just like the young woman I was who jumped into the unknown, we are collectively experiencing the blank canvas. Creative exercises are a great way to foster a sense of well-being, genuine support and deep trust in all areas of our lives when we need it the most.

Gaia Orion is an international artist, an art career coach and a corporate creativity coach www.GaiaOrion.com

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