“Yes, And”: Creativity as a Spiritual Practice, with Lisa Valentine Clark and James Rees

In today’s conversation, we explore creativity as a spiritual practice—not something reserved for artists, but a way of living.
Our guests are Lisa Valentine Clark, a comedian, actor, and host of The Lisa Show, and James Rees—artist, educator, researcher, and passionate advocate for the arts.
Both Lisa and James have spent their lives creating—in front of audiences on stages, in studios, in classrooms—and they’ve come to see that creativity does sacred work inside us. It gives form to what we’re wrestling with. It helps us clarify what we think and feel. It helps us metabolize the unexpected. It draws us into deeper presence.
For Lisa, these insights became intensely practical. She shares the foundational rule of improv, “yes, and”: accept what’s given and build from it. This principle became a discipline that helped carry her through the hardest season of her life.
Throughout the episode, we return again and again to the role of vulnerability—the courage to begin before you feel ready, to quiet the inner critic, and to let something take shape before you judge it. It’s this openness that makes growth possible.
We hope this conversation expands the way you think about creativity and moves you to notice the ways you’re already being invited to practice it.
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