Rediscovering the Self: Music for Wellbeing, Aesthetic, and Making

This chapter explores the journey of creative emptiness to contentment after completing a doctoral thesis in performance arts and education, and family loss. The process of research and writing, while having an element of creativity, isolated me from the making and performing aspect of the multiple art forms I both engaged in and taught. All my creativity left, including that of my academic writing. Shortly afterwards in the space of 18 months all my parental family members passed away, leaving a loss. In dealing with the grief and practicalities of death, I inherited multiple musical instruments. This forced me to reassess my engagement with music as I dealt with what to do with 21 inherited guitars. Having had a focus on drama and movement in my research, I had neglected the making and performance of music which has raw, visceral nature to it. One is not adopting a role but being oneself, with no protection, in performance. I found that playing music and embracing my first instrument, the bass guitar, I rediscovered the youthful energy, joy, and creativity I had let be consumed by research methodologies. The aesthetic of objects, in all sensory capacities, as well as their utilitarian application, created a sense of calm and wellbeing that freed me to research again in multiple ways; and manages to do so today. Through making I can be. This chapter explores through an autoethnographic perspective, and literature, how making and creativity can restimulate wellbeing; the impact upon the academic roles we adopt; and the sense of self within the performing arts.