Is My Ambition Just a Trauma Response?

Or is it fucking magic??!!

I read an article the other day where the writer declared that the more they healed as a person the less ambitious they became. Immediately, a familiar internal narrative started playing: holy shit AM I UNHEALED!? Am I going to wake up one day and realise that all that drive, all that hunger to create and make impact, I had that because I was broken? This is not what the writer was implying, but I am constantly suspicious of my ambition, of my hunger to create, make and connect.

Lessons from the miserably ambitious

This article is not an unusual sentiment. There are many creatives who speak to the trappings of ambition. The emptiness they fel when they get what they aimed for. The goal post moving, the “what does any of this actually mean” revelation. The, I was just searching for validation, but the validation was never enough. The one that I am very sensitive to is the “then I realised that family was all that actually mattered and I should’ve been spending time with my kids and not working”. I don’t have kids and I don’t want kids, and every time I hear an author or artist say that as they reflect on their success, a tiny voice says: am I missing the point of life? Am I going to get to my fifties and think, ah they were right all along, I shouldn’t have tried so hard, I shouldn’t have wanted so much.

Should I not be wanting?

I was put forward for consideration for a large tedX talk the other day. It was perfect timing, just before my book launch. I love public speaking! TedX SOUNDS V COOL! I felt all the ambition. And because I wanted it, I also felt all the vulnerability. To want is to feel very vulnerable. I texted my friend Ella… she reminded me it is OKAY to want things. And I found that incredibly revolutionary. I needed to be told that.

When I was mega depresso, I got very into meditation and buddhist teaching, it helped me a lot. But I always really struggled with the eradication of desire. Desire for me has always been fucking delightful. Why would I want to stop wanting?
Perhaps I am so far from enlightenment that the concept is impossible to grasp but, for me, right now, unenlightened: to want is to be vulnerable and human and beautiful. I love wanting. I love longing. I love desire.

But with wanting, comes pain…

Look, nothing is confirmed, but I’m pretty sure I didn’t get the TEDX gig. It’s been over a week since the supposed urgent interview and they’ve gone radio silent. So, how does this ambitious writer feel, in the face of this not quite but almost certain rejection? Give me a moment to check in with myself… It’s annoying. This opportunity would’ve timed out very well for the book launch - and that’s a bummer. But … I can handle a bummer. I will eventually have an opportunity like that again. I have a fierce, trust in my inevitable successes. It just wasn’t meant to happen now.

I do not feel less than. I actually feel like I learnt a fair amount from that experience, so in actual fact I feel more than, I am more than before. I am just getting better and fucking better.

My ambition and my desire to write amazing books, and connect with amazing people - it makes me vulnerable to disappointment and pain. But… I’m okay with that. I wouldn’t want a life where I am not vulnerable. I don’t even know if I want a life with no pain?

Many of us use ambition to fill a hole.

I can tell almost instantly whether a creative’s ambition is being used to fill a gaping whole in their heart. You see them relentlessly pursue MORE in a way that savours nothing. They seek and aspire in a way that does not credit who they already are. They are insatiable in a way that has nothing to do with relishing the taste, but filling a bottomless pit.

Drive and desire is a wild force and it can become unwieldy and destructive. But I feel we are writing off ambition entirely, and that is not something we should do. I think my constant suspicion of my own ambition is because we so rarely see what healthy ambition can look like.

We don’t have healthy examples of ambition.

May I gently, humbly, put myself forward as a candidate.

I am an author of fiction and non fiction, a speaker, a painter, an artist. I long for connection. I want my upcoming book We Need Your Art to ricochet around the world and leave her mark upon many artists. I want my fiction to delight people. I want to make money doing what I love. I want to one day write a screenplay, I want to connect with other artists and collaborate, I want to speak on stages. I want to hug artists. I want a home that has studios to paint in, and to podcast in, and to host workshops in. I want little miracles everywhere. I want to meet Richard Osman. I want him to read my new detective novel and feel that it was really quite fun! I want to feel seen and known, and to see and know myself. I want autonomy, and peace, and travel and excitement, and opportunities and slow breakfasts and red wine in very beautiful glassware. I want cozy book signings in cute english bookstores. I want to fund other people’s creative projects. I want to make real tangible change in our industries. I want to make artists feel fucking powerful. This is my ambition.

What does my ambition feels like?

For me, it fees like creative drive. A compulsion to make. It feels like ideas. It feels like energy, sparkling, glittering energy.

Even when I was going absolutely nowhere as an author, my ambition felt beautiful. Hard. Frustrating. But beautiful. When I was giving the skim flat white lady a full fat cappuccino at the cafe, or spinning around in my office chair from 9-5, my ambition to tell stories and find an audience, and bring artists together, and make movies of my books - they felt far away, painfully so, but they also felt sparkling. Instead of being a victim of my sucky life, my ambition gave me agency and purpose. It was the hope and vision I clung to.

My ambition feels like a clean fuel. Smooth and consistant. Occasionally, it leaves me feeling rushed and urgent, frustrated and pent up - but these feelings are taken care of. I slow myself down, I reroot myself in trust, I have a cup of tea and I bask at what I already have. Do you know how much I look around at my life and BASK?

But Amie, do you move goal posts?

As in, when I achieve something do I move onto the next thing that I want to achieve? Yes. But not without the aforementioned basking. Not without relishing. Not without a glass of bubbly and beaming. And I don’t move on because it wasn’t enough. I move on because I’m a creative force and my interest has been captured elsewhere. There is another story to tell. A new project to create. I am not chasing a goal. I am moving instinctively with my creative flow. I have much to do! And much to enjoy!

But will you actually ever be happy?

I am very happy. Right now. The idea that ambition is always a sign for unhappiness is not true. It needn’t be true. I am happy but hungry. I am delighted and driven. This life of creating and making, fucking up and flailing - it makes me very joyful. I am not chasing fulfilment. I am not chasing being chosen. I am not chasing my own approval. I already have all of that.

So then what are you chasing?

I am not chasing. I am living my life. I am filling my present moments with art, stories, connection, magic and joy. I long for more stories, and so I write them. I long for more creative collaboration, and so I call them in. I long for more weirdly expensive glassware, and so I build my wealth.

This doesn’t feel like a chase.

It feels like purposeful, sparkling living.

So how do we foster healthy ambition?

Don’t get me wrong, I am sure some part of my drive comes from a desire to prove that writing teacher who wrote stupid on my manuscript wrong. I am sure there is a part of me who wants to be on the NYT best seller list, so that I can feel important and special. I cannot purify my ambition any more than I can purify myself. I am human, multifaceted, flawed.

What I know is that I am already enough. What I know is, that I really love giving a fuck. I love a life where I care, and long for and desire and TRY.

I love trying.

I’m noticing that my substacks are becoming something like a journal entry.

You really come with me as I process something, don’t you? I am so grateful for your company and for your reflections in the comments. I feel like I understand my feelings about this a lot better after typing this all out. I understand that when we look at ambition, we are dealing with a powerful force. I understand why I get nervous about my drive. But for me, now, I want to trust my ambition. I want to trust that she is taking me to sparkly places. (She is).

I am AMBITIOUS about giving you a little piece of art to hang in your home. When you pre-order my new book, We Need Your Art, you can enter into a competition to win a custom canvas love note (like the one below), personalised to you!