How to work through resistance

Do you struggle with resistance when you think about creating?

Resistance many times is a conflict between your natural flow and what the mind is obsessing over. Your mind (and body - hello anxiety!) can get stuck in some kind of trauma and it’s pushing against your inner knowing of what you actually desire —- creating!

Somehow our trauma has become more integrated than our natural guidance. Stories like your art teacher dismissing or ridiculing your work, not being seen for your authentic self, having to struggle or hustle all the time. These memories get trapped in our bodies and when we want to create…we just can’t.

It can look like anxiety, exhaustion, procrastination insecurity, etc.

I want to tell you it’s not your lack of motivation, work ethic, or focus… it’s a natural coping mechanism in your body and how it’s trying to keep you safe.

So how do we let go of resistance?
Well, there are basically two ways.

1) Just do the thing. This is what most people teach and it does work a lot of the time. This is because once we start doing the thing we can get out of the mind loop and teach ourselves that we can trust ourselves.

But that doesn’t always work. AND when we force ourselves to do things we are just reinforcing the hustle mode (hello systems of oppression) and NOT listening to ourselves and what our guidance is telling us.

2) identify that the feeling is there. You don’t need to figure out why it’s there but identify that you feel resistance.

There are many techniques that you can use to bring compassion and understanding to that place of fear and resistance such as breathwork, inner child work, somatic experiencing.

What this does is help to REWIRE those old thoughts and experiences in the brain so that you can connect to your deeper self.

Once you can connect to your inner knowing you can ask: What feels true? What do you actually know from that deep perspective? Why do I want to create? Is it safe for me to create?

You will eventually be able to move past resistance faster with deeper motivation and more joy and ease.

Neither is wrong and you can use them both. The key is to find what works for you.