The Darker Side of Creation: When Art Becomes Escape
Creativity is often romanticized - this idea that an artist must suffer, must unravel, must push themselves to the brink to create something meaningful. The “tortured artist” trope is woven into history, wrapped around the legacies of greats who burned too fast and too bright. I never set out to become one of them. But I understand the seduction of it.
Because for all the ways my art heals, there are moments when it becomes an escape that isn’t healthy. When the process isn’t just about revisiting memories but about retreating from reality entirely.
Whiskey and art go hand in hand in the stories we tell ourselves. A dimly lit room, a drink in one hand, a pen or a paintbrush in the other. We glorify the mess, the chaos, as if drowning in it makes the work more real. And sometimes, it does feel that way. A few drinks in, the thoughts come easier. The self-doubt quiets. The inner critic that tells me the work isn’t good enough, that I’m not good enough, fades into the background. There’s a freedom in it - a temporary permission to feel everything all at once without hesitation.
But the problem with using substances as a creative fuel is that they don’t just open the door; they remove it entirely. The lines between creativity and destruction blur. And when the high wears off, when the whiskey bottle is empty, the art remains but so does the dependency.
Cannabis has been another crutch, another key to unlocking the vivid, immersive world in my mind. It softens the edges, stretches time, allows me to sink deeper into the art, into the process, into the daydreams that have always been my safe haven.
But sometimes, that escape swallows me whole. I tell myself I’m using it to create, but too often, I’m using it to disappear. To step away from the weight of real life and slip into a reality I have built in my own head. The high makes it easier to drift, to let the hours slip away without resistance. But the problem with floating is that eventually, you have to come back down.
Since I was a little girl, I have had an incredibly vivid mind’s eye. I assumed everyone did. I thought we all saw our memories in high definition, our daydreams in full cinematic immersion. I only later learned that this isn’t the case - that some people’s minds are blank slates when they close their eyes. That aphantasia exists. That not everyone escapes into their imagination the way I do.
For me, daydreaming is as immersive as a film, as intoxicating as a drug. I can live entire alternate realities in my head, perfect the words I’ll never say, rewrite the stories that didn’t go the way I wanted them to. It is a gift, a powerful tool for creativity. But it is also a trap.
There are days when I get lost in it, slipping into a world I control rather than facing the one I don’t. Hours pass, and I realize I haven’t moved, haven’t eaten, haven’t spoken a word to anyone outside of my own mind. The real world fades, and the one in my head takes precedence. And that’s when I know - this isn’t creativity anymore. This is avoidance. Art has always been my therapy, my way of processing the past, of making sense of my emotions. But there is a fine line between using art to heal and using it to hide. Between diving into creativity and drowning in it.
I have seen the danger of leaning too far into the escape. Of convincing myself that the suffering makes the art better. It doesn’t. The best work doesn’t come from the bottom of a bottle, or the haze of smoke, or the isolation of a daydream that stretches too long. It comes from balance. From discipline. From knowing when to step away, when to let the work breathe, when to ground myself in reality instead of floating in the ether of my own mind.
I still walk that line. Some days, I lose myself. But I am learning to find my way back. Because art should be a way to understand myself, not a way to disappear from myself.
And that is the hardest lesson of all.
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