Lots of questions, but mostly why?

Why Art? Or, if you live in New England, "Why Aht?"

I know I’m not the only one to ask the question, “why do we art?” I’ve googled that question over and over, only ever partially satisfied with the answers. So, I continue to ask the question, determined to satisfy it with an answer. It’s like an itch on my back that I can relieve to some extent but never completely. I just can’t reach the actual spot to get satisfaction.

Here are some of the questions that persist:

• What’s happening when I’m consuming and interacting with art or creating it?

• Why am I content to spend hours of my day engaged in artistic activity? Or, more realistically, why do I regularly daydream about how I could be spending hours “ahting” if it weren’t for the interrupting annoyances of “the rest of my life”?

• Why do I want to create art but at other times I would rather consume the art of others?

• Why do I choose some forms of self-expression over others, i.e. creative writing vs journaling, drawing from real life vs intuitive creative drawing of fantastical creatures? And, when I choose running over art, am I still expressing myself? How?

• When I read or consume the art of others, am I engaging in self-expression or something else?

• Something must be happening - in me, somewhere - to cause this yearning for interacting with art, consuming it, integrating it, and creating it. What on earth is happening and why?

To further develop this last question, which really is the crux of the matter for me:

• What role, if any, does the act of engaging with art (reading prose, listening to music, watching movies) play in my emotional, psychology development? How does it aid transitions in life, assist with developing coping mechanisms (or serve directly as a coping mechanism), and guide me (as rites of passage once did for traditional societies) from one stage of life to another?

• And, for that matter, what am I getting out of creating art? I know there’s the fun and satisfaction of flow, but what is actually happening? Am I working something out? Am I growing? While some may say, who cares, just enjoy… I do enjoy AND I want to know why I am enjoying.

• If there is something going on “in me” that has some sort of psychological benefit, what is that benefit and why is it happening? It just hasn’t been enough for me to know that it’s human nature to tell stories.

As a result of this inquiry, I have dived deep into research which has resulted in copious notes in a Commonplace Book, a Zettelkasten with literature and permanent zettels, research book purchases on the subject with marginalia, library borrowings of novels, Substack searches, and Google Keep entries.

The current scene in my room of my own.

I have gotten closer to some understanding, which is what has prompted this writing. Keith Oatley’s “Such Stuff as Dreams: The Psychology of Fiction” is by far the best resource I’ve found to date. I haven’t finished the book [yet], but I have taken copious notes on the first two chapters and it’s chock full of explanations as to what reading fiction does for our self-development.

“Fiction, in its various forms, presents the consumer with models and patterns about character, emotion, and inner lives which we can then absorb to understand more deeply the world we inhabit and develop (or not) the same in ourselves and in our lives.” [Oatley, p16]

Oatley goes to great (and gorgeously presented) lengths - using Shakespeare’s “model of the world” theater as an example - to explain how consuming fictional content can provide the reader/audience with a simulation of possible worlds and that has great psychological benefit. By my read of his argument, interacting with fictional worlds allows us to witness human interactions and relationships, try them on for size in our own psyche without any actual real-life consequences, and develop for ourselves preferences, understanding, and conclusions about emotions, character, and behavior… ultimately allowing us to decide how we want to be in the world, as an individual.

Which brings me to Carl Jung’s concept of individuation. which is artfully summarized by Leon Schlamm [whose work I wish I could access in full - he was a well-known, respected Jungian scholar]:

C. G. Jung defined individuation, the therapeutic goal of analytical psychology belonging to the second half of life, as the process by which a person becomes a psychological individual, a separate indivisible unity or whole, recognizing his innermost uniqueness, and he identified this process with becoming one’s own self or self-realization, which he distinguished from “ego-centeredness” and individualism. [Schlamm, Individuation]

Parallel to and related to this inquiry (although I didn’t know it at first), is my curent read (actually listen on Audible - worth it!) of Sharon Blackie’s “Hagitude: Reimagining the Second Half of Life”. I am, after all, quickly approaching 50! This book is chock full of Blackie’s own observations of her own individuation, her transformation to the second half of life and how novels, stories, and specifically folktales and fairy tales (full of archetypal models of elder women) can help us reveal the purposes and possibilities of inner life, particularly as we transition to elderhood.

“I’ve searched for myself, and the stories I might inhabit, in books.” [Blackie, 44 kindle edition]

It resonates deeply. Blackie has written extensively on archetypes, fairytales (story telling), the mythic experience and individuation. I return to her writing regularly. [Check out this posting on individuation by Blackie].

Oatley’s work on the psychology of fiction, Blackie’s Hagitude (and her other writings), and what I know of Jung’s concept of individuation plus everything else I’ve been discovering on the topic is helping me get at one of the questions I asked above: how does consuming art, fiction in particular, aid us in getting through life’s “moments"? The challenges, the heartbreaks, the transitions?

Perhaps, my own experience of reading fiction, can provide some more hints. There are many works of fiction that I pick up and then almost immediately put down because they don’t “match” my mood or my need, whatever they might be at the moment (although my need never seems to be conscious to me; I just know the novel isn’t “speaking to me”). This explains why I loved “Fun Home” by Alison Bechdel, am engrossed in “To The Lighthouse” by Virginia Woolf [by the way, check out the picture above where Bechdel illustrates a new edition of “TTL”!], and why I am working through “Enchantment” by Katherine May (but for some reason I’m finding it harder to connect with this particular book). And, it explains why I can’t get a foothold in other books, sometimes not even able to get past the first page! There are too many books like this to name here.

Many searches on individuation and artistic self-expression have resulted in few hits to really substantiate what I’m saying. So, I continue to read and search. My next exploration is likely this book “Narratives of Individuation” by Raya A. Jones and Leslie Gardner.

As I continue to search and explore, I continue to read, watch, and create aht. I absorb myself in stories, write down the quotes that speak to me, and scribble in margins. Maybe I’ll come across the answer to my questions by myself just through exploring the feelings, the sensations, and reflecting on the impact of these experiences on… me.

Drop a comment if you have some thoughts and ideas to share! Why do you consume and create “aht” and “ahty shtuff”? What do you think is happening for you when you do?