Lately, I’ve been going through my sketches and paintings from over the years to try to find inspiration, and also to remember who I was before… a lot… happened in my life.

I’ve found a bit of a spark of creativity again as I am starting to see more and more people outright rejecting AI art, at least. The whole thing took a toll on my mental health for months while I was watching my friends fight for their work that was being scraped without their permission, and so many of us in the art and design community struggling to compete with the thousands of new businesses selling AI art on products, passing it off as their own work.

It was downright depressing, and giving me a full blown existential crisis.

I can say with confidence though, that lately I’ve been seeing the light at the end of that tunnel, as well as having come to some realizations about creativity in general.

Life is meaningless….

Now, hear me out on this one… You can choose to look at this statement with sadness and anhedonia, OR …. you can realize this frees you to live life in ANY way that you choose!

YOU define the meaning of life. THAT is the meaningLESSness of it all

There isn’t any one meaning, therefore, it can be anything to anyone!

This thought has freed up so much space in my mind to get creative and define my own rules again.

Sure, there are things that I can’t control, and things that are most definitely hard, but what I CAN control, are my own standards and values.

Making an actual game plan for myself has been pivotal in finding myself after some of the hardest months of my life.

Defining Values

I eventually realized that the root of all my existential angst could logically be traced back to a need every human has, even if it’s not always at the forefront of our minds – purpose.

When a robot could suddenly replace my entire identity, it felt less like I was losing my career, and more like the world had imploded.

What would be the point of being human if we did not need to be creative? What is valuable in this world now? These are a few of the endless amounts of questions I kept going around in circles trying to find the answers to. Eventually though, I found a common thread in all the articles, podcasts and videos I was constantly consuming to find the answer – core values.

Logically speaking, defining one’s core values can actually solve many problems, help one to make many decisions, and guide a person towards a life that is both fulfilling and meaningful.

And the best part – we each get to decide what those core values are. These can be the compass that helps us navigate so much of life’s murky and confusing waters, especially in times like these where everything seems like it’s being turned upside-down at any given moment. Holding true to yourself, and defining what means the most to you can help ground your soul when nothing else seems to make sense.

An exercise that helped me immensely was simply writing down EVERY value I believed could be important in a life. Then, I broke those down enough to end up with a handful of authentic values that I could keep in mind while deciding on SO much of my path forward. As I work on my business and career, as I decide how to take care of my mental and physical health, how I cherish and set boundaries in the relationships in my life – the possibilities of the application to these new personalized “rules” for life are limitless.

Knowing Oneself

The other benefit of defining one’s values and crafting a life this way is the cohesive intertwining of all the different aspects of your life. Your life starts to “make sense” when these concepts are the glue that holds everything together. This prevents compartmentalization or even paradoxes in your own life in general. There will rarely be a conflict of interest in your mind if you truly ask yourself if the action you’re about to take aligns with your definition of yourself in this sense. Everything flows together once you uphold these core truths about your life.

This list also can help with some of the more difficult decisions in life. Obviously not every single thing we do in life can be morally perfect. That wouldn’t be possible. This system can also help when deciding between two evils (ahem…. no reference intended considering the current circumstances in the US).

All in all, it may seem like a simple task to define your values, but once you start applying these principles in your actual experience, your reality will change quickly and sometimes dramatically! You may discover that some habits go directly against something you believe in whole heartedly (for me lately, that has been alcohol – I take ridiculously good care of my body, yet I was putting poison in it for so long.. made no sense!)(More on that later)

Let me know in the comments if you already have an idea of your truest core values! I’d love to hear what means the most to you in this world!