How To Give Your Creativity the Kiss of Life

There are probably many times you’ve felt your creativity has left you completely, that it’s dead and buried, and you can only now visit its gravestone and reminisce mournfully at the good times you had when you were younger...

Well, the reality is far from that bleak or final. Your creativity may be in a state of slumber, but it can never die. Here then are 5 steps to giving YOUR creativity the kiss of life:

1. Be open to your senses. All creative inspiration comes via our five senses--they’re the channels through which we experience the world. If you’re not fully aware of your senses though, it’s the equivalent of watching a black and white TV with the sound turned down. And your eyes closed! Visit places that are full of life and interest, and just sit and focus on each of your five senses in turn. Notice the fine details of what’s unfolding around you in a way you’ve never experienced before. The more you do this, the more creative inspiration and ideas you’ll have.
2. Gather ideas. Many of us measure our creativity by how many ideas we have. No ideas = creatively dead. Actually the problem is nearly always that you’re just not capturing your ideas, so you’re forgetting them as quickly as they come. Carry a notebook or a camera or a voice recorder of some kind with you. Whenever you get a flash of an idea, capture it as fully as you can. You’ll soon find this habit is infectious and you’ll have an abundance of great creative ideas to develop.
3. Recognise your strengths. Do you find yourself enviously studying other artists, wishing if only you could be as talented/ creative/inventive as they are? It’s a shortcut to misery every time. The irony is, other artists will look at YOUR work and feel the same! So instead, focus on building your own unique creative strengths. Make a list of your strong points and the creative projects you’ve been most proud of. There’ll be far more than you thought.
4. Follow your passions. Time and energy spent trying to create what you feel you SHOULD be creating (or what you think others think you should be creating) will always result in frustration and a slow slide into a creative coma. Follow your passions – the projects, ideas and mediums that really jump out and excite you – and you’ll find your creativity is always ready and waiting like an eager energetic puppy that just been told it’s time for “walkies.”
5. Start something. Today. You can only create up to a certain point in your mind. Then you need to put pen to paper, paint to canvas, or hands to, well, anything! Be kind to yourself, choose a small creative project that excites you and start creating. Keep your creativity alive by focusing only on the creative moment, forget about the final outcome or trying to be perfect. Often the best and most enjoyable sessions of creating come when you’re lost only in creating and the rest of the world fades into the background.

Follow these steps to give YOUR creativity the kiss of life. They’re not just first aid, or a quick patch up to get you hobbling along again, they’re all techniques you can incorporate into your daily life to help keep your creativity healthy, happy and thriving!