Finding it hard to sink into your creative practice with the all that is going on in the world?
You wouldn’t be alone there. I know that many people are excited to have more time at home to create and some are even producing some beautiful work but for many that I speak to this just isn’t the case.
In Sacred Arts we’ve been exploring holding space for the last month- holding space for ourselves and for our creative practice and what many of us are finding is that this means just allowing our creative practice to be what it is- to not have expectations of it, to not beat ourselves up for being too stressed to created, for not being prolific and to celebrate our creative practice in all its forms- the good, the bad, the ugly, the slow, the fallow, the curious and the prolific. Be kind to your creative practice!!
Creativity is cyclic
Creativity goes underground- to process, to digest, to compost, to transform
Creativity is internal as well as external
Creativity should not be something to do on your “to do” list but something to be.
Creative Tending
While acknowledging and honouring that sometimes we just need to rest, to allow our creative practice to become fallow, to go underground, to compost, to ready itself for germinating and all the other pieces of the creative cycle, here are a few gentle entry points that may offer your creative practice an invitation to dance with you and if not they can help prepare you for when that time does come, for it will return, that is the nature of cycles. I’ve broken them up into 4 groups: The Practice, The Container, Filling the Well and Tending the Creative Being.
The Practice:
These entry points allow you to be in your creative practice even if you are not creating “art”, they help build the muscle memory, the hand eye coordination and the techniques that you can apply when you are creating “art”, keeping you limber, so to speak, and they just might lead you down a creative rabbit hole. Just be sure to practice them with no judgement, pay attention and watch but practice silencing that inner critic.
Creating colour charts
This is the sort of creative practice that doesn’t require inspiration. It keeps my hands moving and teaches me about my supplies and colour mixing. In away it is “training” and I find it very meditative.
Testing supplies
Play with your materials, your papers, pens, inks, paints, colours and so on. Mix them up, test them, experiment, combine them in ways that shouldn’t “work”, break the rules and just watch what happens, no judging, just paying attention.
Doodling & Mark Making
Playing without expectation, just for the sheer joy of it, watching the marks appear on the paper, feel the sensual nature of making marks, textures, using colour and just observe- another moving meditation.
Mandalas
Mandalas offer a container into which your creativity can flow. The structure of the mandala itself can take some of the creative pressure of allowing you to “doodle” within a given form. Try it.
Try a different medium,
Sometimes a different medium can energise our inspiration by moving sideways or shift us into beginners mind again where curiousity over expectation allows us to play again.
The Creative Container:
These are ways of fluffing your creative nest, your studio, your corner to create to extend an invitation for the muses to enter in.
Tiding studio
For me this works two ways. Firstly it gets me into my studio, moving amoung my art supplies and projects, both new and old. It allows an opportunity for my curiousities to be peaked by something I’m handling or looking at. It is a tactile reconnection to my practice and sometimes my curiousity gets awoken and before I know it I am working on some old abandoned and forgotten project.
The other piece to this is that it allows me to love up my space, shake up the energy in it, create some beauty and in doing so create an invitation for me to come and be in the space. If my studio is ordered and filled with beauty then I’m more inclined to want to stroll into the space and be there.
Sorting collage papers (or any of your supplies)
Like tidying my studio, this allows a tactile reconnection with my practice and just might trigger some curiousity or inspiration. Try grouping them by colour, theme, size, importance and before you know it you might just be gluing them onto a new piece.
Create a Studio Altar
I’m not going to go into the many ways and hows of making an altar other than to say to make it your own, keep it as simple or as complex as you like, make it beautiful, use it to set intentions for your work, to create some rituals or to invite in the muses to play. Make it a physical representation of your creative practice so that as you tend it you are energetically tending your creativity.
Filling the Well
We can’t create if our well is empty, first we must replenish our creative well so that we are fully ReSourced and ready for InSpiration
Find Inspiration
It is everywhere if you look with eyes of wonder. Try art books, films, walks, your own work, music, dreams, a story, poetry, a fallen petal, the texture of an old wall, the way two colours sit side by side- literally everywhere.
Learn
I’m sure you have a wealth of online workshops you haven’t had a chance to dip into- try just watching, even if you are not in the mood to create, you’ll be filling your intuitive well both consciously and unconsciously and you never know, something may sweep you up in inspiration.
Nature
Getting out in nature can remind us of the cyclic nature of our creative practice, offer us a change of scenery or opportunity for movement and can “hack our creative flow”. And, of course, it can be ever so inspiring!! Mother Nature is the supreme creative force.
Other Artists
Immerse yourself in the work of artists whose work you love, watch movies and documentaries about them, visit art galleries, peruse Pinterest and find new artists to inspire you.
Gather Beauty
We each have our own aesthetic that speaks to our soul. Gather yours around you, surround yourself with beauty that brings you joy and enlivens you.
Feed the Senses
Remember that you are a sensual being, that each of the senses needs to be fed- listen to music, bird song, eat with your fingers, your eyes as well as your taste buds, try something new, enjoy the warmth of the sun on your closed eyelids, the breeze on your skin, find smells that enhance your surrounding. Fill your creative well with all your senses.
Tend the Creative Being
For me this one is the most essential- look after yourself, allow yourself to be a being not a doing and KNOW that as a human you are creative to your very bones without even trying.
Stay Connected to self
Stay connected to yourself, listen to yourself, both the light and the shadow, the inner child and the grown up, dialogue and reflect with yourself. This might look like meditation, paying attention to dreams, quiet walks or a moment of solitude with a cup of tea first thing in the morning. Whatever it looks like to you stay in conversation with the creative being that is you.
Nurture your Curiousity & Wonder
Follow your inspiration and curiousity when it shows up, don’t silence it by saying you should be doing “X” or you don’t know how to “Y”. Honour your curiousities and allow them to lead you down creative rabbit holes.
Journal writing
This can be a way to empty out, to hold, to hear our own thoughts or to uncover inspiration.
Movement
Movement is one of the ways we shift the energy in our bodies and move trauma out. Moving can rewire what we are feeling and may just bring inspiration. Shake, dance, walk, run, yoga- your body is made to move.
NAPPING!!!
Allow your creativity to flow, allow it to guide you rather than forcing it, allow it to be wild and prolific one day and gentle and quiet another. Don't judge it. Allow it
CREATIVE BEING over Creative Doing
Galia Xx
