Techniques to Get From Flaw State to Creative Flow State

I once gave a dulcimer to a child. He asked several questions about how to play it. I assured him there were no rules. He could strum or pluck the strings and play however he wanted. He looked at me with wide eyes and asked,

I assured him it was. If I could talk to him again, I would add,

“Yes, it’s a free instrument and you are a free musician.”

We all have children inside us, who we once were and still carry within us, who long for the freedom to create. When our creativity is blocked, we are not allowing our Inner Child to be free. Here’s why we do it, and how we can learn to free our Inner Creative Child.

What are your subconscious thoughts about yourself and your creativity

When you procrastinate writing, familiarly known as writer’s block, what are your subconscious and conscious thoughts? Conscious thoughts might include:

I’m not funny anymore

I can’t think of anything to write

Everybody (or a specific famous writer) is better than I am

I’m not good enough as a writer to keep going

We’ve all had these thoughts. The feelings attached to them are often depression, fear, anxiety, or agitation, none of which are good for the creative process. In fact, these thoughts and feelings make writing, or creating in any field, an uphill battle. With weights attached to our ankles. Or, more accurately, to our minds.

As a writer and a psychotherapist, I’ve observed these heavy thoughts and feelings, and the behaviors, or lack thereof, they lead to. I’ve seen them both in myself and in my clients. These thoughts and feelings are not “who we are” and they are not our personality. Children aren’t born being negative with low self-esteem. They are taught negativity and low self-esteem.

In therapy, we can address the thoughts that cause these feelings with Cognitive Behavioral Therapy. You can also do it yourself right now, using countering statements like these:

I’ve been funny before, so there’s no reason I won’t be funny again

If I relax, and look around me, I can think of things to write about. I can take an object I see or a recent experience and begin writing about it

Who cares if someone else is better than I am at my craft? I’ll work on being the best I can be

Who says I’m not good enough?

Where our negativity came from

The last one leads us to discovering and countering our subconscious blocks. Someone, somewhere, told us we were not good enough.

You may find yourself wanting to argue against believing others told you that you weren’t good enough. My clients often argue. When I ask my clients who told them something negative about themselves, they often say, “I did” or “Nobody, it’s just true.”

It is not just true, and somebody did tell you that when you were young, even if not in those specific words. Although sometimes those were the exact words. Don’t believe me? Try this:

Take a minute to think back to the earliest age you remember not feeling good enough, or smart enough, or committed enough to create or succeed.

What age are you?

Who else is there?

What are they saying?

Do you believe them?

What do you tell yourself about yourself?

This is the deeper work

It takes more than cognitive reframing to uproot these memories and change the decisions you made about yourself. Gestalt therapy, Inner Child work, and Re-decision therapy help find and change these embedded thoughts and feellings.

I’m a Gestalt therapist, and I encourage you to work with a therapist when you’re well and truly stuck. However, you can do most of the work of unblocking your creativity, and changing your subconscious drivers and blocks, yourself.

After following the instructions above — remembering the earliest age you felt inadequate, and determining who told you — decide how you want to think about yourself and your abilities going forward. Who did you picture in the memory with you? Was it a parent, a grandparent, a teacher?

Place the memory of that person in a chair in front of you. As the adult you are now, tell that person what you want to say in protection of the child you once were. Tell them they are wrong about you. Tell them you will no longer listen to their negative voice.

You are good enough, and your inner child is good enough. In fact, you and your inner child are creative and strong. Tell the person in the empty chair those new beliefs until they are convinced, or at least promise to keep silent.

Then, put your Inner Child in the chair and, from your protective adult self, tell the child all the things you needed to hear as a child. Give your Inner Child all the positive messages you didn’t receive when you were a child. Let your Inner Child know those particular adults were wrong about you and your abilities. They were operating out of their own fears.

Create new affirmations to counter the negative messages. Personalize them to you and your creativity. For every negative thought and feeling you identify, come up with a counter one, and tell it to your Inner child until the child within you believes it.

. . .

I taught writers about this work on Medium Day 2025, and the year before led writers through the process in a longer seminar for MuddyUm. People were moved to tears, accessed their Free Child, and were delighted to be able to write freely without prompts during the process.

Sometimes I have nightmares that I wake and there’s no coffee. Please stop the nightmares and buy me a coffee. https://ko-fi.com/carolsantafe

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This post was previously published on New Choices.

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