Before you ever touched money…

before you understood value…

before you had language for identity…

you had imagination.

Creativity was your first economy. Your first freedom. Your first way of making sense of the world around you. You didn’t need permission to create. You didn’t need a budget. You didn’t need an audience. You just made something because something inside you wanted to come alive.

Kids don’t ask, “How much does this cost?”

They ask, “What can I make?”

Somewhere along the way, life convinced us creativity had a price tag. That you need the right tools, the right space, the right connections, the right time, the right confidence. But that’s not how creativity started, and it’s not how it works.

You were creative when you had nothing.

Which means creativity can’t be taken, only silenced.

And that silencing usually doesn’t come from lack. It comes from pressure. From responsibility. From comparison. From criticism. From adulthood turning survival into the only goal. But creativity is older than all of that. Every time you create, you return to something ancient inside you, something rooted deeper than circumstances.

Creating isn’t just making content. It’s remembering who you are. It’s the soul breathing. It’s the inner world taking shape in the outer world. It’s you saying, “I’m still here. I still have something to offer. I still have vision.”

You don’t have to monetize your creativity to honor it. You don’t have to turn it into a business to validate it. Sometimes creativity is simply the doorway back to wonder, and wonder is where life feels alive again. 

Start small. Start simple. Start honest. But start.

Reflection Question:

What did you create freely as a child that you’ve ignored as an adult?

You were born to create.
- Danny Ortiz

P.S. If you know someone who is creative and has stopped creating share this with them