Have you ever looked at your life and realized that while everything is “okay” on paper, you feel like you’re speaking a completely different language than everyone around you?
In this week’s Report from the Creative Closet, we’re looking at what happens when we challenge our idea of what “normal” is. From the culture shock of a Doctor Who convention to growing up in a family that didn’t understand the things I loved, we talk about why normal is a matter of perception, not a fixed rule. I discuss why your creative practice thrives when you find people who finally understand you, and how my Restorative Creativity Framework helps you rediscover the real you hidden under the “shoulds” of adulthood.
It’s an invitation to stop performing for the sake of being “good enough” and start returning to the creative capacity you were born with.
I’m Nancy Norbeck, and I’m your Messy Muse Mentor. I help people feel alive again through curiosity and play.
In this episode, we discuss:
- The Relative Normal: Why the definition of “normal” changes depending on where you stand.
- The Power of Recognition: Why being with people who understand your “geeky” interests is a fundamental human need.
- Masking vs. Truth: How to know who you are under the layers of cultural expectations and performance reviews.
- Returning to Self: Why the things we love are the signals that tell us who we really are.
Ready to send your inner critic to summer camp for an hour?We get together once a month for a relaxed, co-working-style session where you can work on whatever you want—without any pressure to do it “right.” Join the Creativity Circle.
Get in Touch
I’d love to hear your feedback, questions, and experience with these ideas! Send me a note at fycuriosity.com, or contact me on Instagram, or Bluesky.
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Nobody is Actually Normal | Report from the Creative Closet #9
Please note: This is an unedited transcript, provided as a courtesy, and reflects the actual conversation as closely as possible. Please forgive any typographical or grammatical errors.
Nancy Norbeck [00:00:06]:
Welcome to Follow Your Curiosity. Ordinary people, extraordinary creativity. Here’s how to get unstuck. I’m your host, creativity coach Nancy Norbeck. Let’s go.
Nancy Norbeck [00:00:19]:
Welcome to this week’s Report from the Creative Closet. I wanna talk this week about the idea of normal. What exactly is normal? We don’t think about this a lot. I’m thinking about it right now because I am going to a Doctor Who convention. By the time you see this I will be back from the Doctor Who convention. But, every once in a while I like to go to one of these and that’s why I’m dressed this way. And going to a convention like this really makes me wonder about normal because we spend a lot a lot of time thinking about what’s normal and worrying about whether or not we are normal. And the thing is when you go to a convention, Star Trek convention, Doctor Who convention, probably a healthcare convention, an engineer’s convention, anything like that, where you are in a room with a lot of people who have a shared interest and are pulled out of ordinary daily life where we are all mixed up and you have just those people with that shared interest, whether it’s a professional interest or, you know, a a nonprofessional interest, like a fan interest, everything’s a little different.
Nancy Norbeck [00:01:37]:
Right? Because everybody’s speaking a different language. If I went to an engineering convention, I would have no idea what these people were on about because I am not an engineer. And the same thing is true if one of those engineers who was not a Doctor Who fan walked into a Doctor Who convention. The convention that I’m going to is at a small suburban hotel and every once in a while, in fact, pretty much every year, somebody walks in who clearly does not realize that they have booked a hotel in a a room in that hotel for the weekend or has chosen to eat in the restaurant that is attached to that hotel that weekend when there is a fan convention going on. And we all usually, or whoever’s nearby, notices this person, and we all kind of think, oops. Somebody’s here and has no idea what’s happening. Because there will be a lot of people who are dressed like me or dressed even more strangely in full character cosplay. And they’re just standing there going, where am I and what is happening? Because we all get it.
Nancy Norbeck [00:02:49]:
We all know exactly who that character is or what this scarf is about or even what this t shirt is about. Hello, fifth doctor. And they haven’t got a clue. And for them, it’s like they have gone through the looking glass because dressing like this every day, not normal. Dressing like this at a fan convention, perfectly normal because normal is relative. It changes depending on where we are. And your normal may not be somebody else’s normal, and that’s okay. I mean, let me give you an example.
Nancy Norbeck [00:03:26]:
Growing up in Who fandom versus my first time at a convention. My family does not understand science fiction. No one in my family understands science fiction. I often say that I grew up with the only engineer who’s not a Star Trek fan because my dad does not comprehend science fiction at all. My dad is fully reality based. And there are a lot of people who would say he’s an engineer. I hope so. But most engineers, at least the ones that I’ve encountered, love Star Trek.
Nancy Norbeck [00:04:01]:
My dad is not one of them. And so when I discovered Doctor Who when I got into high school, this was just not something that registered with him at all. And I took a lot of crap from my family for watching this weird TV show from The UK with strange looking aliens and a guy who got into a blue phone booth and flew off somewhere. And, you know, the sets wobbled and were held together by bubble gum and duct tape. And I loved this and they could not comprehend it because all they could see was strange aliens and wobbly sets. And that was in the eighties. The farther back in time we went to the seventies and the sixties, the weirder it looked to them, and it just did not work. That was all they saw.
Nancy Norbeck [00:04:55]:
Meanwhile, when I look at those shows, I see a show about a science based hero, more more or less science based, we’ll we’ll stretch that word a little bit, who fights for the underdog and stands up to totalitarianism and corporate evil and stands also for the fact that every single one of us is important and has something of value to contribute to the world. One of my favorite quotes from Doctor Who is from the new series where Matt Smith’s Doctor says, “Not important? Not important? In nine hundred years of time and space, I’ve never met anyone who wasn’t important before.” For me, feeling completely misunderstood my whole life by my family, hearing a line like that even decades later still hits. And I mean, in the eighties, in my high school, most of my friends had no idea what I was on about either. Fortunately, I had one who did. She’s the one who got me into it. So, you know, normal is largely a matter of perception and largely a matter of, you know, what side of something you’re sitting on.
Nancy Norbeck [00:06:13]:
To me, what’s happening in that engineering convention doesn’t seem normal because I don’t understand it. To my family sitting on the other side of the TV screen, trying to figure out what the heck this weird show is. They don’t understand it either. And so it’s totally weird to them. To me, it made perfect sense and it was completely normal. And so, you know, you may be thinking that you would sooner die than wear something like this to a convention, and that’s your call. And not everybody who goes to a Doctor. Who convention dresses up in any way.
Nancy Norbeck [00:06:47]:
But those of us who go to a convention regardless of how we choose to dress, not only feel like we’ve come home, we generally, and I can’t speak for everybody, but there’s a reason that we go. Right? We generally feel like we have had the most alive weekend we’ve had in long time because we are with the people who understand us. We get to do the geeky thing that we love in a concentrated environment for two or three days, and it is just not the same as sitting at home with your Blu rays or your streaming service. It’s just not the same experience, especially when you get to talk to the people who make that show, the actors and the behind the scenes folks, and and also, you know, your fellow fans and have geeky conversations. Now I’m not telling you all this to defend Doctor Who even though it might seem that way. The important thing that I want you to take away here is that you find what matters to you and don’t let anybody take it away from you even if somebody else thinks that it’s not normal. Way back in 1986, I could have let my family convince me that this show was stupid and take it away from me. And if that had happened, I probably wouldn’t be coming to you with this podcast.
Nancy Norbeck [00:08:08]:
I probably wouldn’t have written I’m sure I wouldn’t have written a book because I wouldn’t have started writing the way that I did. I wouldn’t have ended up interviewing so many people who have been on Doctor Who. And I probably can’t even name the, you know, a number of other things that it’s contributed to indirectly in my life. The things that we love that other people think are weird, as long as they’re not hurting us or somebody else, are the things that tell us who we really are. And the things that tell us who we really are are the things that give us back to ourselves. So, you know, the only time that normal matters is when you’re sitting in a doctor’s office or a therapist’s office or when somebody comes to me and thinks that they’re totally weird about something that’s actually totally normal, like being blocked creatively or getting disconnected from themselves in this totally weird culture that we live
Nancy Norbeck [00:09:04]:
in, where you’re told that you have
Nancy Norbeck [00:09:05]:
to be this way or that way, because that’s gonna disconnect just about anybody. Then normal is worth its weight in gold because you know you’re not the only one, which, interestingly, is also what happens the first time you go to a fan convention and realize that you’re not the only one. And that’s also part of what restorative creativity is all about. It’s all about helping you reconnect with yourself through six different areas that I work with to help you rediscover who you are under all of the different layers that the culture makes you put on that hide you so well under the veil of culturally approved normal that sometimes even you can’t tell what’s really you underneath. And most of us feel better when we actually know who the real us is, even if we have to put on a show to go to work or to please our family at dinner on Sundays or whatever that is that we do because it makes our lives a little bit easier. Whether or not that’s right or wrong is above my pay grade. Your life is yours, and you’re the one who can tell. But knowing who you are under all of that so that you can live from your truth as much as possible, that is a truly amazing and liberating thing.
Nancy Norbeck [00:10:40]:
So if you like this little slightly weird, but normal in its way, corner of the Internet, I really hope that you will follow or subscribe and stick around because you are welcome here in the creative closet anytime. You’re also welcome at the next Follow Your Curiosity Creativity Circle where you are welcome to bring your own particular brand of weird, whatever you like and consider normal for you. And come join us for an hour on the fourth Saturday of every month. And, you know, work on that thing for a while, especially if you haven’t been getting to it on your own, but even if you have, you’re welcome to come and join us, get to know some people. We have a good time, and we make some progress on that thing. It’s free, and the link is in your podcast app or under this video depending on where you’re listening to this episode. And either way, thanks for spending some time with me here in the Creative Closet. I am your messy muse mentor, and I help people feel alive again through creativity, curiosity, and play.
Nancy Norbeck [00:11:43]:
If you’re tired of thinking about answering a creative call but never actually doing it, Come join me for an hour and start feeling like yourself again. The Follow Your Curiosity Creativity Circle is a safe, welcoming, and encouraging environment where we send the shoulds and inner critics off to summer camp, where they’re kept busy rather than getting in our way. You can find it at the link in your podcast app. See you there, and see you next week. Follow Your Curiosity is produced by me, Nancy Norbeck, with music by Joseph McDade. If you like Follow Your Curiosity, please subscribe, rate, and review on Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts. And don’t forget to tell your friends. It really helps me reach new listeners.