During large life changes, you yourself change. Whether it’s moving, going off to college, family members increase or decrease in number, intense drama in your friendships and/or relationships—your self is affected, and your creative powers can be affected too.

Part of personal change is just growing up, maturing, adapting. However, big life change can take those elements and make them much easier or more difficult. You will gain new aspects of self and creative expression, but you may lose some too. Sometimes those losses aren’t necessarily good, and it can take a lot of work and reflection to get them back.

One of the biggest life changes a young person can experience is the transition from high school to college. Not every youth goes this route, due to personal preference or inability, but I won’t pretend to understand and speak for this demographic. In my own experience, this transition was very beneficial to my sense of self. I’d been waiting my whole life to get to college, especially as an art kid where I can finally explore what I wanted in my education with people who cared about the same things. In high school, I was very apathetic and unhappy, particularly because I was in a small Southern town and had very different values than the majority of that population. I didn’t fit in and grew cold because of it. However, out of my emotional and mental stifling, I created so much art, painting and writing and drawing as an outlet for my passions.

When I traveled to art school and found my people, I finally bloomed. I was so happy, I was constantly doing art with other artistic people and we were all growing and learning together, and my self-esteem and confidence were at all-time highs. This was what coming into your own feels like. This is what’s supposed to happen.

Positive personal change is fantastic, but sometimes to win some you gotta lose some. As different aspects of your life take priority, others will fall farther down the list. Sometimes it’s not talking to your family or old friends as much, participating in unhealthy behaviors or not engaging in your other hobbies or activities like you used to. For me, my writing took priority and I hardly ever painted or drew. I would constantly feel guilty about not working on all my arts, but felt too busy or dispassionate to do it.

Finding time for every aspect of your creativity can be hard as you transition into adulthood. Getting jobs, going to class, doing homework, having a social life and other activities like clubs or sports can wrack up a lot of hours in the day. Being able to sit down and just do your personal work can fall pretty low on your to-do list, which is very saddening and frustrating. If only once a week, setting aside time to yourself is so important to not lose practice of your arts. Think about where your creative powers are leaning lately, and explore that, even if it’s new, even if it seems like steps backwards.

Negative life change is awful, but can be the precise opportunity to redeem some previous losses. For example, my serious relationship fell apart recently and took a major hit to my emotional and mental self. However, all of my loved ones and friends are very excited for me to return to myself, pre-relationship. As I previously stated, life change rearranges your priorities, and that relationship was number one for a long time, even when it shouldn’t have been. So now that that priority is nonexistent, I can focus on me and the other relationships in my life. That happiness and confidence of arriving to college is returning, and I’m reflecting a lot on what makes me a happy and healthy person. For me, it’s focusing on my arts and engaging more with friends. I've been thinking about and working on art that I've previously not done very much, and while it's befuddling to me to stray from my usual media, it's freeing, and I feel full with creative power. Similarly, while alone-time has always been an important thing for me, right now what gives me energy and peace is company. Sometimes adapting to life change means adapting to new aspects of you, which can make you nervous. I know it makes me nervous, knowing that I’ve changed and am changing as a person, but I know that as long as it’s what’s best for me, I need to allow myself to grow and evolve and explore how to cultivate it positively. All life experiences, positive and negative, create and change you. It’s important to recognize this and look within yourself to see how best to learn from those experiences. Personal growth may be reverting, drastic change or a subtle evolution forward—all are valid and all a learning process. Accepting who you’ve been, who you are, and who you want to be, and how you want to express your creative powers through all that, is a challenge, but so worth it.