SELF-EXPRESSION: An Interesting Trait

            I slipped the photo into the frame, hung it on the wall and stood back looking at it with smug satisfaction. Beautiful! That’s my creation! Even though the photograph inside was that of a beautiful landscape, nothing of which I had created… I couldn’t help feeling joyous with the final product. I had managed to capture the idyllic scene through my lenses and my mind’s eyes had visualized it hanging on the wall eventually and here it was!

         Why was I feeling smug and satisfied? It’s the same ‘high’ I get when I finish a painting or writing. Was it because I felt that I had expressed myself on a visual medium? There’s another baby from me, I say, after I am done. Are creative outlets a prime way of self-expression? 

       Research indicates that self-expression is a healthy outlet for people in communicating with the outer world. This communication could be through any medium such as writing, painting, giving speeches, holding conferences or just talking.  It was also noted by psychologists that people who cannot communicate well feel frustrated as they are not able to ‘socialize’ their thoughts. I am not sure I agree with that since I know people who are quiet and reticent socially but are like the rock of Gibraltar, very steady and calm otherwise. My own brother belongs to this category and was always the calming presence in our house.

      As humans we are social beings and we tend to gather and communicate and share life’s experiences. Finding a captive and receptive audience further enhances the ‘adrenaline rush’. The feeling of shared self-expression, the feeling of initiating an artistic bond with the others, the feeling of understanding and encouragement that the collective self-expression garners, releases a creative explosion in the mind. The person who is encouraging or listening also benefits since it triggers certain latent creativity in them too.

     It’s a conscious, sub-conscious effort on our part to share our inner thoughts about life in general with others. An artist self-expresses with his paintings and in due course of time exhibits his art work for the sheer thrill of sharing his expressions with others, in addition to monetary benefits. The buyer of the painting on the other hand uses somebody else’s self-expression to express his love for art-work and anything artistic. He displays the purchased art-work at home, which soon becomes a subject for discussion and secondary self-expression

    So what happens to people who are not gifted with a creative ability to self express? Does it mean they are sadder humans than the rest? The answer would probably be ‘No’. Self-expression could be in any form and does not necessarily have to be in the form of an ‘art-work’ or ‘writing’. The simple act of talking to others or even to one-self is a means of ‘letting it out’. The thoughts or expressions are taken out of the system temporarily and the mind is ready to move on.

 An every-day example would be passengers on a bus or train. One person opens up a conversation about the dismal weather and the other agrees to it saying how he/she is affected by it. Right there was an outlet for an emotion, even if it was about something mundane like the weather. This opens up another interesting topic on ‘conversations’. The ‘what’, ‘why’ and ‘whatever for’ we do it…

    It’s one of the most natural tendencies we have as humans. Everybody has something to say, something to share, a story to tell, an opinion, a disagreement and so on... It’s a euphoric feeling of freedom of expression. Its might not always be for the ultimate purpose of validation, but as a natural outlet for a person’s creativity or revealing the ‘self’. A person could have infinite sources within himself, which brings a sense of calmness and peace, after self-expression. A calm mind has more vitality than a mind overflowing with negativity and suppressed emotions. The calmer mind has more forbearance and the exhilarating power of dealing with life’s challenges. This might sound overtly philosophical but it does make sense in a pragmatic way.

I am no expert in this field. I am merely expressing and sharing my random thoughts here!

(Posted on my previous ID: 2007)