A Creative Explosion Within Four Walls

If you had asked me ten years ago when I would be at my most creative, I would almost certainly have given you the wrong answer.

I would have imagined it would be while leading consulting projects, facilitating workshops, travelling the world, sitting with clients, speaking at conferences or rushing between airports. Surely creativity belongs to people whose worlds are expanding, not shrinking.

Instead, the opposite seems to have happened.

Today, my physical world is remarkably small. Most days are spent within the same four walls, moving between my chair, my bed and the bathroom, with the occasional trip to synagogue or a medical appointment. It is certainly not the life I imagined for myself.

There are two ways of looking at that reality.

The first is to focus on everything that has been lost: the travel, the excitement, the spontaneity, the opportunity to visit remarkable places and the countless freedoms that PSP has steadily taken away. Some days I do exactly that. It would be dishonest to pretend otherwise.

But there is another way of looking at exactly the same four walls.

Within them I have experienced the greatest creative explosion of my life.

Without the constant pressure of flights, meetings, deadlines and the next client presentation, my mind has been given something it rarely enjoyed before: uninterrupted time. Time to think more deeply, to learn more widely, to write more consistently, to pray more thoughtfully, to reflect more honestly and, I hope, to help other people more meaningfully.

Ironically, I produced an enormous amount during my working life. There were workshops, reports, presentations and strategies that mattered greatly at the time. Yet I sometimes wonder whether the work I have done since retiring because of PSP may ultimately prove more enduring. I have written books, hundreds of blog posts and weekly Thoughts on the Jewish themes , while also having conversations with people living with PSP across the world. Complete strangers have become friends, and, just as importantly, I hope I have become a friend to some of them too.

Technology has made all of this possible. Although my physical world has become much smaller, my community has become immeasurably larger. From one chair and one computer or iPad in Israel, I can learn from, encourage and connect with people across continents. I still find that extraordinary.

None of this is to suggest that PSP has been some wonderful gift. I hate it. I miss travelling. I miss spontaneity. I miss the independence that most people never even think about until it disappears. Those losses are real, and they always will be.

However, I have learnt that two apparently contradictory things can both be true at the same time. My world has undoubtedly become much smaller, yet, in some unexpected ways, my life has also become richer. Creativity, purpose and friendship are not determined by the size of the room you occupy, but by what you choose to do within it.

I cannot choose how much PSP takes from me and how quickly it does.

But I can still choose what I create with what remains.

Perhaps that is one of the greatest freedoms any of us will ever have.