When you were a child, your first thought when you woke up in the morning was not about productivity – all the things you had to get done in the day. You woke up everyday with something interesting you wanted to work on – something beautiful in mind to create. When you were your most creative self, it was as if “time” and “days” didn’t exist. You were literally inside the drawing or the song or the Lego building with which you had, at the time, become obsessed. Everyday was a day to create, until it was time for dinner.

Then at some point, you had to “grow up” and “get responsibility.” You had to “become a productive member of society.” At that point, it may have also become about making money and “winning” (being successful).  It was then you also took on some structure and expectations – the rules that now govern your life.

We set up all kinds of little boundaries and rules for ourselves, which define what it means to be good and competent human beings. They come from others, from inside ourselves, from religion, society, and everything everyone says. Your ego laps it up; its job is to make sure you are valuable. “You have to add value!” your ego screams. Your ego also makes you anxious when you are not living up to your inner archetype.

In the natural world, creating and being productive are the same thing. Structure and limits exist, but the organisms in the natural world don’t seem too concerned or anxious about any perceived expectations they themselves have or anyone else has for them. Every living thing simply spends its life converting energy into beauty. Sometimes the beauty shows up only for a single dramatic moment, with no need for an audience. Bamboo grows for 120 years, flowers once for a short time, and then dies, in a singular, spectacular event.

You too, will die. But be careful about having to live up to some “legacy.” Legacy is something our egos create to make sure we are always judged valuable – by ourselves and others. That is all a waste of time. The goal is to be ego-less and to have no thought of yourself. Forget yourself. Just create. That is what you were born to do.