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Is There Such a Thing As Truly Unique Creative Work?

by Abby Kerr

in Uncategorized

About this column

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This blog post is in support of a new book by Michelle Ward and Jessica Swift called The Declaration of You. It’ll be published by North Light Craft Books in Summer 2013. If you’re a Voice Bureau reader who isn’t familiar with Michelle and Jessica’s work, I’d recommend taking a look if you have a high Enthusiasm or Playfulness value. In their own words, readers get “all the permission they’ve craved to step passionately into their lives, discover how they and their gifts are unique, and uncover what they are meant to do.” Learn more about The Declaration of You’s BlogLovin’ Tour, and how you can participate, here.

Uniquity and I have an intense relationship.

As an Enneagram Type 4 — and if you know what that means, you’re probably chuckling to yourself already — To Be Unique, Original, Individualistic, Myself feels like my soul’s deepest longing. Type 4s long to create an original identity — the same way Type 2s long to be cherished, Type 6s long to be supported by others, and Type 9s long for inner peace.

Photo by Ross Griff (rossaroni) courtesy of Flickr Creative Commons.

The quest for what Michelle Ward and Jessica Swift term ‘uniquity’ has driven and defined my life.

I’ve been the eight year old girl whose blood ran cold with anger and astonishment when her church friend dared to name her new stuffed animal the very same unique name I gave mine (Tiffin, if you must know, after the town in Ohio I’d never been to but seen in my dad’s atlas).

I’ve been the sixteen year old girl whose heart broke into a million pieces when her ballet friend (a different person this time) named her new golden Cocker Spaniel the same name as my long-dead golden Cocker Spaniel. (Rudy, may he RIP.)

I’ve been the shopkeeper who inwardly rolled her eyes when a socially advantageous customer requested to know what her friends who had purchased housewarming gifts from me earlier in the day had gotten, so that she could make sure her present was on par, price-wise and impressiveness-wise.

I’ve been the blogger who rolls her eyes outwardly — right here, in front of my Mac as I type — when I read stuff online that feels derivative, recycled, or like a mash-up of Blogger X, Y, and Z’s latest articles. Really, people? I think to myself. Was that worth publishing?

I can’t even listen to audio interviews of me from my earlier days in business because so many times I refused to make a statement without attributing it to the person I heard, learned, or read it from — which makes me sound like a bona fide name dropper. Integrate the teaching into my own framework and put it out there as mine? Nooooooo. Not unique enough.

And while I’m a great curator, you’d better believe there’s no quicker way for me to short circuit a work day than to spend the first hour of it clicking through links on Twitter, reading Other People’s Stuff. Damnit! I’ll think. There goes that topic.

My personal recipe for Uniquity has always been: look away from everyone else! Your creativity has nothing to do with theirs!

I’ve been (privately) critical of other business bloggers whose work I’ve seen as “push off” pieces — in other words, they’re not actively developing and teaching their own methods, they’re just “pushing off” of other people’s with a light (or harsh) critique, or teasing out one undeveloped point from the original piece and making it. And yes, I’ve written a few pieces along these lines, too.

(There’s nothing inherently wrong with the above approach, by the way. I’m just a Type 4.)

It wasn’t until I found myself feeling shackled to Uniquity as the most important component of any creative endeavor that I felt moved to take a closer look at what was really driving me.

Several years ago, I asked myself, “What would you, at the age of 94 after a well-lived life, regret not having done?”

Only one thing came to me strongly and clearly, soared up into the open sky of my mind, a warm, soft-bodied bird with an all-knowing glint in his eye: Write and publish your book, it said.

And I knew it was true. Writing my book is it for me. That’s my Thing.

Here in my mid-thirties, I’m a working writer — I’m founder and Creative Director of The Voice Bureau, I still write copy occasionally, and I create lots of teaching and learning materials for our clients and readers. I love to write. I write every day.

But I’m not writing, you know, my book.

Because, well, “everybody” writes books. (No they don’t.)

And “everybody” has a story in them that needs to be told, and what if it’s like my story? (It both will be and won’t be.)

And which is the better route these days — self-publishing or traditional publishing? Which holds more prestige? (That’s my high Power value talking.) Which is easier to market and sell? Will one of the routes banish me to the pile that’s “just like everybody else?”

And so on.

Many times, my prerequisite to Be Unique, Above All, keeps me from ever beginning my great work in the first place.

That is no longer okay with me.

A conversation with (of all people) a health coach friend of mine got me thinking about my creativity in new ways: What if, she said, you were allowed to look at other people and in other places for creative inspiration? What if you didn’t expect yourself to reinvent the g*d*mn wheel every time you write a blog post? What if being UNIQUE meant just being you — and the whole world was available to you as inspiration?

I liked those ideas. And whoa — what a different way of being in the world that is for me.

My instinct is to tie up this piece with a nice little bow, bring it to a tidy conclusion, an exhale.

But we all know that creative work, defining Uniquity for ourselves, and claiming a true and original identity — that’s big human stuff, dudes.

I don’t want to sell you short by pretending that it isn’t.

So I’ll just let you in on a promise I’ve recently made to myself: I am allowed to be expansive. To be all-encompassing. To be Yes and No and All and Some and Never and Maybe. To be in the thick of a creative swamp and to be standing willfully on the rooftop of a building I have erected myself, a building called Unique — and both places are equally valid.

And whatever I am when you see me there — that’s me. Unique enough.

In the comments, I’d love to hear:

What’s your relationship to your own Uniquity? Equally intense? A little more loose and free-flowing? Tell me about it.

{ 19 comments… read them below or add one }

Stephanie @ Fairground Media June 11, 2013 at 1:38 pm

Ah, Abby. I can relate to this so hard– maybe because I’m also an INFJ? Thanks for articulating this perspective better than I could have done and for the reminder not to let this uniquity neurosis thing take over. Much needed. :)

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Abby Kerr June 11, 2013 at 1:42 pm

Ahhh. Breathing deeply to see your comment here, Stephanie. Thank you for joining me in my neurosis. :) Could definitely be an INFJ thing.

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Meg Worden June 11, 2013 at 4:22 pm

LOVE this so much, Lady.

All of it that comes from us is just an amalgam of everything moving through us.

This post made me take deep breaths and relax.

XO

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Abby Kerr June 11, 2013 at 4:27 pm

Thank you, Meg. Glad you found yourself in there.

xoxo

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Kari June 12, 2013 at 2:29 am

Abby, are you an INFJ?

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Abby Kerr June 12, 2013 at 8:18 am

Yes, I am! You?

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Susan June 12, 2013 at 1:16 pm

See? This is like that newsletter quote I love so much. It’s like you’re in my head sometimes. THANK YOU for articulating stuff like this, Abby. It’s so helpful.

It was not until I studied the Enneagram (to the degree I have) that I saw how MUCH uniqueness (feeling “special”) has driven me in my life. Actually it wasn’t until you pointed me to the Tritype thing that I saw that I am influenced by “4” both in my wing and in my heart center of the Tritype. This is a BIG thing for 4s.

It sort of shook me when I first realized this about myself. Like, “Oh… that feeling is because of *that* and that argues against the reality of the thing. Maybe I’m NOT unique. Omg, that’s terrifying thought.”

I’ve since recovered. Sort of. lol

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Abby Kerr June 12, 2013 at 3:46 pm

All of this self-revelation is somewhat terrifying, isn’t it? And yet freeing, too.

Means so much to hear that you get value from the stuff I dig, too.

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Laura Simms June 12, 2013 at 1:29 pm

Love it.

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Abby Kerr June 12, 2013 at 2:51 pm

xo

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Molly Morrissey June 12, 2013 at 1:44 pm

Que girl who moved to England in her early 20s cause being American was so… normal and stupid and oppressive. Sigh. Thanks for this post. The struggle of my life.

I also have a book that haunts me. You’ll appreciate the name of the writing group of which I’m a member, drawn from an only-sort-of-kidding comment that I made while the group was forming about a wildly popular lifestyle memoir that was published a few year ago and for which I was in such contempt: “Bitch Stole My Idea”.

Good thing being an entrepreneur has forced me to get over myself a wee bit.

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Abby Kerr June 12, 2013 at 3:45 pm

Oh my God. YOU. This comment. Bitch Stole My Idea. Right?

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Paige Baldwin June 13, 2013 at 4:17 am

Molly! Bitch Stole My Idea got a literal lol out of me. I love your last line too. It IS pretty humbling, isn’t it?

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Susana Frioni June 12, 2013 at 1:45 pm

Such beautiful insight Abby! On some level we can all relate to this – we’ve all got a little 4 flavour to us (even if it’s not our dominant type). Standing on the rooftop with you! XO

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Abby Kerr June 12, 2013 at 3:46 pm

I love having you stand beside me on the rooftop, Susana. And yes — I love the wholeness of the Enneagram and how we can find ourselves in just about every type. Looking forward to sharing your expertise with our readership here at some point soon. :)

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Paige Baldwin June 13, 2013 at 4:26 am

All of this rings so true to me too. It touches nicely on that whole paradox of being human (and thus encompassing all of humanity as part of who we are, simply by virtue of existing as a member of this species), and being one specific wholly unrepeatable person. It’s one of those both/and things that still kind of stretches the edges of my mind whenever I think about it.

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Caroline Frenette Master Intuitive Coach June 13, 2013 at 5:50 am

Standing up clapping hard and cheering to this :

” What if, she said, you were allowed to look at other people and in other places for creative inspiration? What if you didn’t expect yourself to reinvent the g*d*mn wheel every time you write a blog post? What if being UNIQUE meant just being you — and the whole world was available to you as inspiration?”

Just a couple of weeks ago I took my client in an IN-Vizion process where she explore her GREATNESS. She felt surprised yet relieved at the simplicity of the vision and at how organic it felt.

Sometimes we’re expecting greatness or uniqueness to be GRAND and OVER THE TOP while sometimes it’s much simpler than that…

You can exhale now.

:)

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Kate Fagervik June 13, 2013 at 5:14 pm

Ditto. Loved your blog lovin’ post (gave your enneagram a shout)

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Wendie Tobin June 19, 2013 at 1:36 pm

“Many times, my prerequisite to Be Unique, Above All, keeps me from ever beginning my great work in the first place.”

Well, hell.

(Type 4)

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