Coming soon: Van Gogh’s Missing Ear

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The psychologist, Frank Xavier Barron, who spent most of his career studying creativity and personality said, “The creative person is both more primitive and more cultivated, more destructive, a lot madder and a lot saner, than the average person.” Vincent Van Gogh is a prime example.

As Barron’s quote suggests, possessing a creative spirit is not without its risks.

I had the fortune to attend a legal seminar, the topic of which was professional burnout and dissatisfaction, where one of the speakers explained how he had gotten away from his own creativity as a legal professional. He explained how that sent him on a downward trajectory into depression, and how he pulled out of it. This is what he said, more or less:

“Though I have had success at painting, ultimately it was not enough to pay the bills. So, I went back to law practice, and this is what I discovered. My creative pursuit makes it so that I can be a lawyer. To be just a lawyer is not an option for me. I tried that, and it almost killed me.

“Painting also helped me to discover what that horrible feeling in the pit of my stomach was. It was my creative spirit. That spirit, without an outlet to create, became my mortal enemy. What I learned is, if it didn’t get to create, I didn’t get to live. I let it out to paint. The hatred, anxiety and despair that it was became grace, beauty and goodness at the point where the brush touches the canvas. Even when I am done working on a piece, that feeling of satisfaction I get from the act of creating stays with me, even when sitting at my desk at the office working on a mind-numbing case. As a result, my legal work–and life in general–is of a higher quality than it would be without my painting.

“Some of us are charged with the mandate to create, or whither on the vine, and spend wasted lives in the service of absurdity.”

Whether you are charged with the mandate to create, or not, Mad Mike’s America will soon have a new page devoted to the creative spirit featuring art, literature, music and anything else that might make you say, “wow,” and keep those of us who contribute mostly sane. It’s called, Van Gogh’s Missing Ear at Mad Mike’s America.

We hope you like it.

Leave your knives, swords, cleavers, battle axes and other sharp instruments at the door, please.

About Post Author

Collin Hinds

Senior Writer and editor.
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Peggy Roche
12 years ago

Lawn boy….you have always been very talented and artsy! 🙂

Bill Formby
12 years ago

I look forward to your contributions there Collin. You do have a talent for creativity.

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