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So while I've been teaching myself to draw again, I've been thinking about the concept of emotional safety when creating art. And while that relates to almost all art we create, I make games so I will talk about it through the lens of that.
Emotional safety relates to creating things that feel comfortable to make, that you feel sure of, that don't require a lot of discovery or risk to have to throw out old concepts or concepts you are married to. We all require some amount of emotional safety when creating art.
A very small example of this is that people procrastinate on painting hands or don't paint them at all because they are difficult and scary so the emotional safety with engaging with that part is low.
A bigger example of this when creating games and working in games are phases of rapid prototyping, the times when you are still trying to figure out what the core of what you want to make is. Rapidly throwing out concepts is a time of low emotional safety while making art.
Beginner gamedevs have an overarching tendency to stick with things they know for exactly this reason. Anybody who has taught young devs knows the endless amounts of backstory and character descriptions instead of mechanic prototypes - backstory is emotional safety.
It can also manifest in gamedevs never finishing a game, never reaching the difficult time of user testing and bug fixing and instead continue to layer new mechanics because that is emotional safety when creating art.
I realize this is kind of an obscure thread but what I'm trying to say is this: Understanding what parts of your work make you feel emotional safety and which ones don't will help you grow as a creator because you can actively work against the mental block.
Understanding times of high and low emotional safety of your team will ALSO make you a better leader, manager or director because you can think more clearly about how to shepherd your team through times of emotional uncertainty in a creative process.
Teams in times of low emotional safety need more reassurance and care, need to have those feelings acknowledged and potentially need to be pushed to leave the comfort zone for the sake of pushing the concept further and not cling to unsuitable concepts.
We refer to this often as a means of ego and talk about low ego and not clinging to ideas as a good quality in gamedevs. And while that is partially true, I think we would get more out of ppl if we acknowledged times of low emotional safety instead of just talking about ego.
Leaders CAN bridge and even avoid ego-driven development within their teams by understanding these dynamics and counteracting them with care and acknowledgement instead of just writing people off as egotistic.
To come back to me teaching myself how to draw again... It's a really fascinating microcosmos to observe this concept within myself and see where I can overcome my boundaries and how to soothe myself with working on areas that feel emotionally safe to work on.
