Your Creativity is Valid Even if it’s Only for You

There’s a quiet pressure that often creeps in when we create, especially in a world of constant sharing. The idea that if it’s not seen, it doesn’t count. That creativity has to serve a purpose or perform in some way to matter.

But truthfully, your creativity is valid even if it’s just for you. Even if no one sees the sketch you made in the margins of your notebook. Even if the collage you put together doesn’t get framed. Even if your writing never gets posted. Even if your project exists only in your mind.

It still matters.

For those of us navigating chronic illness or disability, so much of life can feel like proving ourselves—proving our pain is real, proving our experiences, proving our worth. But creativity doesn’t have to follow that same exhausting pattern. It can be a soft place, a return to your voice, free of expectations.

Creating is a form of speaking, even if it’s in a voice only you hear. It’s a conversation with your own heart, your own story, and your own becoming.

Your voice is powerful, whether it’s shared loudly or not. The value of your art isn’t measured by how many people like it or understand it. The value is in the fact that it came from you. From your lived experience, your perspective, your imagination.

Even unfinished things matter. Even scribbles matter. Even the things you don’t finish still teach you about yourself, about what feels good, what feels off, and what feels like you.

So if you’ve been holding back, waiting until you “have something worth sharing,” until you “get better at it,” or until you “have more energy,”—you don’t have to wait. You’re already worthy of the joy that creativity can offer.

Whether you create for five minutes in bed or spend hours slowly piecing something together, it’s real, and it’s absolutely enough.

Create for you. That’s where the power begins.