When fear has unfettered access to our community, the first thing to go is our creative capacity. The ability to imagine and take action toward a just and equitable future is displaced by an obsession to get back to normal, to shelter and protect what we have, or get fed up— “man the ramparts” and “go to the mattresses.” Fear, and those who perpetuate it, are betting on our fight or flight response to kick in.

Exerting power over a community is dependent on creativity becoming unavailable. Because without it, hope doesn’t have a chance. If fear works by cutting off our breath and narrowing our vision, creativity is how we signal to one another that we’re awake and still capable of moving forward together. The work, especially in these times of deep disruption, is learning how to call our creativity back.

We may think that we need a 10-point plan or bold, audacious action. Rather, all we may need to do is blow a whistle. What is now a symbol of nonviolent protest against the federal government’s and ICE’s actions and arrests of our immigrant neighbors in Minneapolis started as a simple repurposing of a common item, transformed into a powerful tool of resistance. The creative act itself creates fertile ground for hope to grow and strengthen.

The real alternative to fight or flight is experimentation.

It is choosing to work with what is already within reach, repurposing existing resources, testing new uses, and imagining different arrangements of what we have. It looks like planting many seeds, paying close attention to what takes root, investing in the green shoots that show promise, and carefully cultivating small crops into viable new paths forward. This is how creativity returns through steady, collective acts of trying.

Sometimes the most powerful act is to blow a whistle, reminding ourselves and each other that we are still here, still awake, and still capable of imagining what’s next.