I want what we all want
to live in a terrarium
Hello! This is Bee-Witched, a beekeeper's poetry and art in uncertain times. I also write about mental health and art-making & share simple art projects to help us stay grounded in reality.
And I want what we all want.
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I want to fill my life more deliberately with the things that nourish & fulfil me. I know this is probably what everyone is trying to do all the time, but if you’re anything like me, things have gotten muddled up somewhat and everything you love and hate are jumbled up in the same junk drawer.
But if you could list ten items that make you super happy, and/or most-beloved practices, what would they be? If you had the power to create a world with these elements, would you?
What if that world only contained you?
There’s never been a more important time than now to stop anchoring yourself in structures that are collapsing and start investigating your inherent curiosity. If you can give yourself that space and the kindness to be quiet and start to think, “What can I make?” it gets very interesting. — Martha Beck Constantly anxious? Martha Beck on how creativity is calming - Los Angeles Times
There’d be no-one to judge in this utopian terrarium, because their comments and sneers would dissolve into nothing through the thick glass. We could be free to play, unselfconsciously, with nobody around to tell us we looked like an idiot (or for us to think that they think we’re an idiot).
Some people talk about cocoons and cocooning. Or incubation - of an idea, an artist, a body of work. Other people talk about terrariums.
My friend Charlie was making them with folded origami plants, which got me to thinking about enclosed spaces and the populating thereof with curated, thoughtful items.
The thing about terrariums is that they're a highly artificial yet living environment that you make yourself. Everything that you want to be in the terrarium is put in the terrarium because you're building it. With traditional terrarium design, there's like hardscaping, there's earth, there's different heights of plants, all that kind of thing. All these different elements.
It’s only when you put them together, they make something kind of special.
2025: the year of the enclosed creative ‘genius’
I really like the idea of 2025 being closed: that for a while, maybe for all of 2025, I'll be building this terrarium. I'll be living in this small, comfortable, happy bubble, and something beautiful will come out of it. Creativity thrives where there’s a freedom to explore new things, make mistakes, and just muck about. So many studies support this, but here’s one that really made me stop in my tracks.
Alright, well, back in the 1960s, NASA decided to do a study to find out how they could hire more geniuses. They started with 5-year-olds, and the test didn’t focus on traditional academic intelligence or anything like you’d expect it to. Instead, it evaluated the children’s ability to think creatively and use their imagination to solve problems. A staggering 98% of the children tested qualified as “geniuses,” with natural abilities to think outside the box, or take up unique perspectives, to use their creativity and imagination to find innovative solutions to simple child-appropriate problems.
NASA followed up with these children, doing tests every now and then into adulthood, out of a curiosity to see what would happen. By the time the researchers surveyed adults, the number of creative geniuses had dropped to just 2%. Somewhere on the winding path from childhood to adulthood, the children’s natural capacity for creativity was choked out.
Do you want to join me in building our terrariums? I don’t know what form that would take or what it would even look like, but it’s a totally irresistible image, right? A life that it will only contain the things that I love, or the nourishing things it needs to thrive.
🐝🐞🪲🌵🎄🌲🌳🌴🌱🌿☘️🍀🎍🐝🐞🪲
Thank you for reading, dear friend. Be kind to yourself and everyone else. I always love to hear from you in a comment, with a ❤️, or even a restack to Substack Notes. ✨
Yes! Let’s goooo! I’m so ready for incubation with creativity!