When Therapy Fails Artists
As a challenge to conventional advice about rest and recovery, poet Nada Faris explains the importance of working amid suffering for those who derive meaning and inspiration from their craft. Shakespeare, Woolf, and Orwell did some of their best work in times of despair, after all.
What kind of art should creatives make in charged or dangerous times? In 2013, my mental health suffered, and I had to see a professional. I told the therapist that I could no longer write the same poems, no longer rehearse them, or even perform them in public.
I was suffering from panic attacks, which meant that I could not breathe easily, and I was riddled with anxiety. The slam poems I performed at the time were competitive in nature, so I risked public failure at every event. The audience’s response was immediate, with people either snapping their fingers or hissing their disapproval.
For the first time in my life, I found myself dreading all my upcoming obligations. I shared these concerns with my therapist. “Maybe you don’t have to be a poet,” she said. Maybe, she explained, I was already accomplished enough and did not need to participate in another competition. Maybe I did not need to push myself and should prioritize rest.
Timeless reading in a fleeting world.
