a hermit growing creative community
we are floating, glowing in the unknowable sea/ether of this universe.
table of contents
experiment: how I first created community
recipe: 3 steps for community building
beliefs: why I choose loneliness to be free
freedom: from binary thinking
ethos: a community built on internal intimacy
how I first created community
I began hosting my first creative community, unexpectedly, in March of 2020, when I was spending the pandemic lockdown in a small seaside village in Japan.
I had just abandoned the pressures of NYC life to start a nomadic life slow-traveling, when a short trip to see an old friend turned into a four month retreat from the world - and the embryonic beginnings of something new.
what I created that spring I called an experimental creative course -- 30 days of daily, 3-5 minute creative audio prompts -- which I'd write, record by voice memo on my phone the morning of, and send to two small Whatsapp groups of 3-4 people each. one group consisted of friends I knew from real life; and the other, kindred strangers who found me on the internet.
I did almost no planning, no strategizing, and no marketing.
I outlined some ideas for creative prompts, drew a header image, threw together a page on my site, named the course, "nurturing creative being," and then I sent emails, one by one - to the people I thought might be interested. I made it low-pressure, low-stakes, and low cost - such that I felt like I had no expectations, and absolutely nothing to lose. (looking back, I don't necessarily recommend the low cost -- but it was what I needed at the time). then, I told everyone that we'd be creating the experiment together, day by day, organically.
that pandemic April, the entire course unfolded -- asynchronously, intimately, intensely. I sent daily prompts, and received intimate responses from the participants -- sometimes five, ten, fifteen minutes audio messages - sharing pieces of their lives, questions, and inner worlds. I'd wash dishes, fold my futon in my tatami mat room, walk through long neighborhood roads with their voices from halfway across the globe, speaking in my ear. everyone was sharing about the same things: perfectionism, feeling enough, validation, digital addiction, confidence, insecurities, connection. I listened intently, and responded to every message as thoughtfully as I could.
the intensity of it felt like summer camp, or an interactive podcast, or a group of creative friends who'd known each other much beyond this brief window of time. I had just entered a phase where my philosophy for work and life was anti-perfectionism, and no planning - and I had no plans for what this group would be. the result delighted me.
I discovered that, without the heaviness of pressure, I simply found the freedom to nurture connection, to encourage play, and explore creative possibilities.
I thought I was building a course, but in retrospect, I see how I was planting the seeds for a community unlike any I've been a part of. it was intimate, magical, thoughtful, and tender; filled with women who were asking the same questions that I was, craving sustained inquiry and honest conversations that nourished them -- in a way that the social media scroll didn't.
I built a community much like I built a body of creative work.
3 ingredients for community creation
What did I do to make it happen? only three things:
- INTENTION: I set an intention - a space to explore your creative practice
- CONTAINER: I created a container -- in this case, it was 4 weeks in small groups on WhatsApp, via voice messages, asynchronous.
- INVITATION: I invited exactly the people (energies) I wanted to be in it. at first, I sent 1:1 emails. eventually, I moved onto posting in my newsletters, website, and IG -- and deliberately used very specific language to attract the energies I wanted.
(there is so much more to say on this recipe later (and how it applies to many other things) -- perhaps in a later post)
since that first creative beings course, three years ago, I iterated the course again and again, until eventually, I got a little tired of it. I hosted a follow-up integration course, concocted an intense website building course for creatives called house on the webs, built a project management program for creatives, called lonely work, and ran several more seasons of creative circle.
each time, I was delighted to discover that the people who walked into the course were exactly the ones I would've handpicked, myself, from a room full of strangers. they were insightful, sensitive, gentle, emotionally-attuned, intuitive, intellectual, spiritual, worldly, kind, open, empathetic.
each time, the experience felt resonant with something within me -- some desire to nurture, guide, inspire, and encourage the potential creative energies in others to materialize into the real world.
I discovered, almost by accident, that I was good at holding space for others - perhaps because I'd spent so much time, all those existential, lonely years, holding space for myself.
why I thought I had to chose loneliness to be free
looking back, I realize that I've always felt like the outsider in many communities.
I spent my childhood as the only Asian girl in a small town in North Carolina; my teenage years studying intensely, plotting an escape to somewhere cosmopolitan, like New York City. I spent my twenties in New York City, constantly anxious and disillusioned, experiencing one crisis after another, quitting jobs and ending relationships, slowly revealing, rejecting, and deprogramming myself from the socially inherited norms -- in particular, my Asian-American conditioning -- of what "success" truly meant to me.
I decided to work for myself, then I committed to being an artist -- in spite of everything. the process of choosing myself (my dreams, and visions) over a sense of belonging to any institution, job, or approval from my community, including my family and friends -- was lonely.
and of course, it was also by my own doing. during the hardest years, I was a combination of defiantly independent, sensitive, and stubborn. looking back, I see how my subconscious beliefs around community carried with it -- a sense of wounded-ness; feeling rejected and unseen, and thus rejecting.
my inherited beliefs were:
- that no community could understand me; let alone support my journey
- all communities will limit me, tie me down, and my desire for expansion
- in order to find my truth and happiness, I must be alone/lonely.
most of this, I think I developed in response to my family pressure to do something "reasonable" with my life. by the time I left new york city, just before the pandemic, I found the clarity within myself that success was neither money, prestige, nor career, nor social validation of any sort, but simply: doing whatever the fuck I want to do. success, for me, meant freedom, and I believed that the price of freedom/success -- was to be alone.
embracing monk life
and so, I came into the pandemic lockdown in Japan ready to live monk life -- a spiritual-creative retreat away from the world. whereas other people felt deprived by pandemic restrictions, I felt richer than ever. I was filled by the wealth of my own mind, my inner world, my surroundings - alone in a village with one close friend - doing simple, daily routines. I quit social media, kept my phone off until 5pm everyday (a form of digital ramadan), and luxuriated in my own creative practices. I embraced a life of creative hermitude -- as my deepest form of nourishment. I created a sacred space for myself that felt transcendental; made of stardust, otherworldly.
perhaps it makes sense, then -- as the paradoxical duality inherent in all things -- that there, during creative monk life, is where I birthed the first seed of creative community.
freedom from the rigidity of binary thinking
in this past year -- ironically, in my year of the hermit -- I've been discovering this truth:
you don't have to be alone to be free. you can be supported by the relationships, communities, places that nourish you, and help you in your growth and expansion.
lately, I've been feeling a calling - a whispered invitation from the universe -- to finally, deliberately embody the role of community grower, builder, nurturer of interconnected gardens/ecosystems on the internet.
for many years, I was reluctant to do this - even when it happened, organically, teaching courses didn't quite feel like something I deliberately choose - it choose me. people asked me to _build something to help them with X or Y problem, and I responded.
ARTIST + GUIDE
perhaps because I struggled with boundaries and over-giving in my relationships, I also struggled to lead courses and communities in a way that felt fully reciprocal, and energetically sustainable.
I didn't know how to give to myself and give to others in a way that felt good; how to be an artist for me AND be guide for others, making art. instead, I oscillated wildly between the extremes. I didn't know how to do one -- and not completely forget that I was, also, fully -- the other.
when I taught courses, I was afraid that I'd lose the part of me that just wanted to turn off the wi-fi, ignore everyone, and disappear into my world for a few days or weeks at a time, such that each sunrise and sunset that passed felt like a floating pastoral dream.
then, when I retreated from the world to do just that, I'd emerged feeling extremely disoriented; uncertain how I was relating to the world. where do I go from here? was I truly meant to hoard my gifts, and live as an artist-recluse, painting in my cave? was I not stunting my own expansion by inadvertently hiding? was I not meant to serve others, to be of service with my art and process? did I not want it -- or was I just resistant and afraid, somehow, of letting myself take the stage, to allow myself to be truly seen?
AVOIDANCE IS A FORM OF FEAR
in retrospect, I can see how my entire life has felt like running away from communities that - in my mind, were trying to oppress my individuality. I was stuck in the fight/flight mode -- I carried a combativeness which got me out of gilded prisons; a flightiness that kept me moving.
but even when there was no longer anyone left to fight, I had trapped myself in an either/or dichotamy - I was afraid that being a guide or community builder would make me less of an artist; I was afraid that being connected to others -- in community -- would take away from my freedom. even as I was teaching creative courses or doing client work, deep down, I felt as though I was losing my hard-won, sacred sense of self -- in that act of being of service to others.
ANCHORING IN MY SACRED SENSE OF SELF
it took me many years to find integration between the two, and to realize these truths: I've deliberately built a life such that my sacred creative energy is rushing through my veins, like blood; my creative rituals are deeply structured in my life, like bones -- that there is no part of me that I can possibly lose. there is no one to fight, except myself -- so maybe I can put the sword down, now.
I bring my power to being a community organizer, a guide, an entrepreneur -- because I am first and foremost, an artist.
I see being an artist as having nothing to do with museums, galleries, or residencies -- but as being someone who's committed their lives to harnessing, practicing, and using creative energy to manifest beauty, truth, and power from nothing -- a drawing, a song, a website, a community, a business empire. and as such -- it is the most powerful energy there is; and not unlike being a sorceress-magician.
a community built on inner intimacy
this is all to say:
these days, I've found myself in an era of integration and evolution. I'm finally ready to see growing a community in the same light as nurturing a garden, building a body of creative work, or designing a digital ecosystem. I'm ready to build it, my own way.
in some senses, perhaps my hermit temperament is well-suited to being a community grower, in that I can be fully present in giving, and holding space for others. I don't have the same hunger for community, creative collaborations, support, or accountability and structure -- the way that others do. perhaps I've trained myself to be a self-nourishing ecosystem -- or perhaps this too, is just a defense-mechanism that I will slowly shed. ultimately, to grow, expand, and thrive in this interconnected world, no one is truly a hermit on an island. (even if some days, I'll still want to act like one.)
my intention is to build the kind of community I never found --
- I want to build a space that encourages and deepens one's relationship with oneself, first and foremost -- as the act of filling your own cup, first -- then allowing your fullness to overflow, and to nourish others.
- I want a space where we can all go venture deeper into exploring our own idiosyncrasies, individualities, our unique shades of truth -- what makes us different, and what makes us the same.
- I want to explore what connects us as creative beings -- ultimately, to each other, to our environment, the planet, the universe.
- I want a community that fosters intimacy with ourselves, intimacy with our art, and intimacy with others, as a self-reinforcing cycle. I want to encourage cyclical gardening, shared gardening.
- I want the kind of community that allows us to feel more free -- and yet, stronger, and more nourished, capable of building more, together.
help me build it by filling out this form
here's the first iteration of this community - microgardens - and a google form I've made so that you can be a part of this process with me.
ultimately, I want to acknowledge that the act of making art, chasing a lonely flame, pursuing a vision, growing a bold new world of any sort -- is going to be an inherently lonely act -- that calls for gentleness and support.
my role is to affirm that, to encourage us to turn inwards, as much as possible - and to turn towards each other -- like stars, twinkling at one another, in the night, saying:
you are alone there in your pocket of the universe, but also not alone. in the sacred act of making something out of nothing. I support your aloneness, and encourage you, and empower you to go inwards, deeper, to excavate your treasures. and then, whenever you're ready, come to the garden, and share your the sparkling wealth of your light with us ✨
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Shall we keep in touch? I send guide.notes — a weekly newsletter on the process of nurturing the creative life, as well as a monthly artist’s digest. You can help me with my ongoing community experiment / creation — called microgardens — by filling out this Google Form.