Creativity means not caring what people think. Need help not caring? Summon the defiant spirit within. Martha Beck reports.

 
It was about the fourth time my daughter Katie had made cookies on her own. She was 12, which is precariously close to 13, which in humans is not an age but a serious mental disorder. As Katie whipped the flour into the butter before adding the eggs, her father nudged her aside, taking the electric mixer from her hand.

"No, not that way," John said. "Here's how I do it."

Our usually timid daughter yanked the mixer back and said, with cool conviction, "I really don't give a damn how you do it."

John and I stared at each other across the kitchen, thinking, as it later turned out, the very same thoughts: that neither of us ever would have spoken to our parents that way; that Katie's collision course with puberty was revealing new, profoundly bitchy aspects of her personality; and that we couldn't have been prouder.

It had taken each of us nearly 30 years to claim clear identities, to stop censoring ourselves in deference to the social pressure that weighs so heavily on every human being not raised by wolves (wolves are bitchy by definition).

To be truly creative we must be willing to say to every other person on earth, "I really don't give a damn how you do it." Your creativity will likely never emerge if you don't let your bitchy side do its work.    So you've made mistakes? "Big, fat, hairy deal," your inner bitch will say. Learn from your errors and do better next time. Afraid you'll fail and look stupid? Your inner bitch doesn't give a damn how you look; she'd rather try and fail than not try at all. Let your bitchiest side attack your shame, actively and aggressively, until you are certain that no choice you make is based on either the fear of being shamed or the intent to shame anyone else.

I advise many of my clients to spend at least two hours a week "romping." Creativity consultant Julia Cameron calls these expeditions "artist dates."

Simply take yourself for a long walk or on a trip to a favorite locale, and then explore whatever sights, sounds, and smells arouse your most visceral interest. Buy toys that make you loll out your tongue with desire, from shiny beads to a high-powered telescope. Sniff restaurants. Hang out with the people you want to lick.

One thing's for sure: If any woman unleashes her creativity, her world will split open. She'll find unprecedented ways of solving problems, bridging gaps, and expressing her soul, and her corner of the world will be irrevocably changed. I'm not sure what the changes will be, but I know the words I'd use to describe them: Bitchin', baby. Bitchin'.