Answering the pressure to monetize your passion & creatively express yourself // Pressurized Soulpreneur series: pt 2 of 6

In this episode, I'm going to discuss what is typically the first major inflection point in the journey of a soulpreneur: the decision to creatively express yourself and monetize your passion, and how to manage the pressures you'll face at this point in your journey.

This is the second episode of a six-episode podcast series called the Pressurized Soulpreneur. If you haven’t already listened to last week’s episode titled, “How your human design pressure centers impact your business” I recommend you listen to that episode first before tuning into this one.

You can experience the pressure centers at various stages of the Soulpreneur journey, from the initial business idea, which is what we’re discussing today, to scaling your business AND how you can recognize and manage these pressures with your intuition.

For most of my life, I believed that I was not a creative person. I would tell everyone that I was missing the creative gene or that I was “too logical” to be creative. I couldn’t draw and didn’t like to write throughout my childhood. I believed I had failed at every avenue of creativity that I tried, and so I gave up completely.

One day, relatively early in my growth journey, when I was still working in a job that I desperately wanted to escape from and that was taking a huge toll on my mental health, I finally committed to devoting time to myself every morning in the form of 10 minutes of free writing in my journal and a 10 minute guided meditation.

I will never forget the day that I felt a strong pull. I was watching TV or maybe doing something around the house, and all of a sudden I felt this strong pull to draw and learn how to hand write, and how to write pretty letters, came out of nowhere. It was so random and yet so strong that I knew I had to follow it. So I bought the pens and the paper and started practicing for fun, surprising my husband just as much as myself.

I don't remember the exact timeframe, but relatively soon after; I was woken up in the middle of the night with poetry running through my mind. It was quite shocking for someone who hated to write. So I stayed up late writing those lines into the Notes app on my phone. Honestly, I was quite confused by what was happening, but through this experience, I started to realize that by telling myself and everyone around me that I wasn't creative, what I was doing was blocking my innate creativity for years, for decades even.

I was telling everyone that I wasn't creative, I was too logical to be creative, and I was almost putting a magical spell on myself, blocking my creativity and just shutting it down before it even had the chance to flow through me. And at that point when I had the nudge to start, I finally allowed myself to continue to practice playing with writing and drawing for a little bit.

It started to be a great way for me to reduce my stress and my anxiety and it was just a fun way to pass the time that wasn't just zoning out in front of a screen, which was so much of the way that I relaxed. So what I liked about all this at the time was that it was a way to relax that didn't involve any sort of technology or screen. It was just me and the paper, and I let things flow.

As soon as my skills started to get better, the next question that popped into my mind was, "Okay, how do I start sharing this with others? Is it good enough for someone else to enjoy it? Wouldn’t it be great if this became "my thing"? How can I use this as a way to finally leave that soul-dimming job I have?”

I started researching online: who else does this and how do they do it? How do they monetize it? What would it take for it to be enough?

So clearly, I’m not in the business of writing poetry and hand lettering it now. BUT I 100% believe that it was the starting point for me changing my belief around my creativity and what the definition of creativity was And for the record, I deeply believe everyone is creative once they decide to believe that about themselves.

I also believe that it was the true starting point that led me to where I am now in my business. I look back upon that magical time, awakening to my creativity and authentic self-expression, and it almost pains me to think about the pressure I put on myself to take it to the next level.

The pressure I’m talking about is what appeared before I even understood what that creative expression meant for me personally. I share this story because I think if you’re here, you can probably relate. There’s either been or will be a point where you consider taking something you are passionate about, something that has changed your life, something that is deeply and personally you and putting it out into the world with the hope of creating a source of income out of it.

And with that comes pressure, with the responsibility falling on each of us to discern and navigate this pressure, within us and around us, to decide what the most aligned action and direction are for us at that moment.

These pressures you’re facing at this precious time are real, and from a human design perspective, you feel this pressure in one of two ways: the pressure to figure it all out, which comes from your head center; and the pressure to take action and push it forward, which comes from your root center.

When you come to this inflection point, here are some of the key pressures you will face.

With your human design head center, the pressure to ask questions and figure it all out with your mind.

Your head center is the pressure to figure out what the purpose of this creative expression is-

So, like my adventure with hand lettering, there might be so many questions pop up:

a) What is the purpose of this creative expression in my life?

b) Why is it here?

c) Why did it appear unexpectedly, and is it relevant to me?

d) Why did this come in?

e) Which can quickly escalate into a greater question of your soul’s purpose?

The Head Center creates pressure to figure out what distinguishes you and why someone would be interested in your work.

If you decide something is is your purpose right now, like hand lettering in my example, all of a sudden you might snowball into asking questions about your soul's purpose and what you are here on this earth to do. This is another pressure from head center pressure during this time if you're at this inflection point.

a) Why should someone buy from you when there are hundreds of others doing the same thing?

b) This has the potential to quickly escalate into a larger issue of how you market yourself and your creative expression.

From these questions, you might discover that maybe your creative expression doesn't fit in a box and you can go off from there, letting your mind center, your head, and your mindset lead the way. But if you’re not careful, it’s easy to get stuck in that pressurized mental loop where the Head center and mind run wild.

There’s also the head center pressure to figure out how to go about monetizing your creative expression

From there, the next question that might also come is that head center might create the pressure to figure out how you're going to monetize this creative expression. So you might find yourself asking questions like:

a) How do I package this creative expression into something that people will not only invest in but also value?

b) Which can quickly escalate into a greater question of selling, sales, and inherent value of that creative expression itself.

So you can see how that mental pressure can just send your mind into planning 10 steps ahead if you allow it. All of a sudden, I was trying to create a business out of it before I had even decided if it was something that was meant for the external world or if it was something that was meant for me. And that is exactly how the pressure point of your head center, can impact you and influence you at this inflection point in your soulpreneur journey.

Now, let’s see how the root center pressure to take action also plays into this.

The human design root center pressure is the pressure to take action and create.

There’s root center pressure to be skilled enough or good enough for it to be monetized

You might decide to just go all-in on practicing or developing skills for you to feel like you're good enough and ready to share your gifts with the world. You might think if you practice really hard or if you work on your skills for the next month or two months and ignore everything else, then maybe you’ll be good enough.

So instead of focusing on your relationship with the creative expression, you start to just focus on the end result of being good enough and make sacrifices to get there.

You focus that action on just building your skills as quickly as you can, and this can quickly escalate into a race until you become the best unquestionably. Which is ultimately a race that has no finish line.

There’s also a root center pressure to share what is deeply personal & put yourself out there to get seen.

So there comes a point, as I described in my journey, where I was like, how do I put myself out there? Do I create an Instagram account? Do I start talking about it with my friends? How do I get this creative expression out into the world? And the initial answer I had was by trying to get visible by showing up on multiple channels or by sharing pieces of yourself that maybe I wasn’t ready to share yet.

I had to decide; did I want to put this personal poetry out there? And there’s the pressure that, to start momentum, you need to start sharing even if it is uncomfortable.

That root center action pressure can force you to put things out before you've decided whether you want to share them or not and that pressure to take action. It can quickly escalate into a vulnerability hangover or it could turn into burnout as you navigate different marketing platforms in new ways.

And also very important is the root center pressure to figure out how this passion or creative expression fits into your existing busy life

Are you scrambling trying to move all the pieces around to make this piece fit if it's not ready to fit? It depends on what phase of life you're in, but this might feel like trying to fit a square peg into a round hole or you might be neglecting other priorities in your life just because you feel this pressure and fear of missing out.

You might want to launch something as soon as possible. You might be trying to jam this hobby into a busy life, which might cause burnout or neglect a slew of other things. It is no fun, and if you continue down that path, it can quickly escalate into making so many sacrifices in other important areas of your life, such as your physical and mental health.

Because you have that pressure where you don't want to miss out, you don't want to miss that opportunity, and by prioritizing, you might have to make sacrifices in other areas and that might create an imbalance in your life.

See how that physical pressure to act can suddenly scatter your energy into a bunch of different areas and activities, leading you to ineffective action, and heading towards the road of burnout, or worse, resenting the creative expression that once brought you joy?

If you’re at this important inflection point in your soulpreneur journey, here are some important questions & considerations.

I can't tell you whether this decision to monetize your passion is right for you or not, but I can at least give you some things to think about that I've learned through my journey that maybe will help you if you find yourself here.

a) If you find yourself mentally getting ahead of yourself, or pushing and forging ahead, simply pause.


b) Do you feel compelled to go public and monetize your passion and creativity simply because you can, or because you are desperate to escape your current situation?


c) Or is it because it’s something you just need to share because you know it will free you (in all ways - spiritually, emotionally, mentally, physically) while simultaneously helping others?

d) Are you allowing the external pressure you’re feeling to be redirected through you and directly applied to this creative expression? Or are you extinguishing the flame of the gift before it’s even had a chance to catch fire?

I was putting so much pressure on hand lettering and poetry that I stifled my creativity before it had a chance to bloom. And that’s why I chose not to take it any further.

Give yourself a chance to reflect on these and get clear on what motivation behind this pressure is that you're feeling in your head or your root center.

If you have a defined head center or a defined root center – You will probably feel this pressure consistently to figure it all out or to take action, so becoming aware of its constant presence of pressure will allow you to take notice and move forward in the best direction and timing for you.

Because you have this consistency of energy, you can develop a consistent process for bringing awareness to it and then transmuting that pressure in the best way for you—through movement, creativity, conversations, and reflection.

If you have an undefined head center or undefined root center - You will feel the pressure to figure it all out or to take action in ebbs and flows. Maybe you don’t feel it until you feel it intensely, and then that intensity disappears until you experience it again, but in a new and different way that teaches you something new.

Because you have this inconsistency, there is wisdom in the ways and intensities in which you can experience these pressures to figure out and take action, and these experiences are highly influenced by who you surround yourself with, your environment, and the cosmic transits at large.

So perhaps you want to have a consistent process in how you come back to yourself when you feel the intensity of this pressure: by giving yourself space, being aware of the transit, by curating "safe" environments for yourself to work through the intensity until you get to a more neutral space and stay as present as possible with this creative gift

Ultimately, trust yourself, your intuition, your passion, and your creative expression to bloom in its own divine timing, because there will come a time when that gift and that creative expression will ask you or pull you to begin sharing it with others. If you allow it, no pressure or force is needed to pull you forward into that next step. People will start asking you about it. You might just feel like you have to share it and you don't care who sees it or when, so you let it flow.

You will know when it's the right time to take the step forward to start monetizing what that creative expression is, and that's only if you give it the space to allow it to pull you forward without that pressure and without that force especially if that pressure or force is coming from a place that's not genuine or not from a place of love.