My Journey Back to Creativity
When my daughter was seven years old, she asked me one day what I did at work. I told her I worked at the college – my job was to teach people how to draw. She stared at […]
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Creativity
How Painting Helped Me Conquer Perfectionism
It is impossible to live without failing at something, unless you live so cautiously that you might as well not have lived at all—in which case, you fail by default. – JK Rowling I’ve always described myself as
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What Changed When I Stopped Consuming and Started Creating
Creative thinking inspires ideas. Ideas inspire change. – Barbara Januszkiewicz I grew up like every other teenager of the 80’s and 90’s – watching MTV. I was obsessed with Madonna, moshed my teen spirit with Nirvana, then entered
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4 Steps to Unlocking Your Creativity (By Using Your Painful Past)
Human creativity is both a gift, and a mystery. And, although we all have the potential to create art and beauty; many of us are either unaware of our ability, or unsure on how to unlock this gift.
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How Art Can Heal Anxiety
The soul always knows what to do to heal itself. The challenge is the silence the mind. – Caroline Myss When will this stop? Perched on the edge of the couch in my dark apartment, I draw deep
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Paint Understands – Using Art to Express the Unbearable
If I could say it in words there would be no reason to paint it. – Edward Hopper We tell small children to use their words. We want to teach them to express negative feelings verbally rather than
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Why Everybody Should Embrace Their Creative Potential
In the earliest days of our childhood we spent a good amount of time doing creative things. We were continually building and creating things like lego castles, forts made of household items, and works of art. Somewhere along the way the importance of this takes a backseat and it’s written off as “that’s a good hobby, but not something you do to make a living.”
Before long we stop creating and turn into sponges that absorb information that is rarely put to use. We go through the motions, doing what we’re told, and are left scratching our heads as to why we’re so bored with everything in your lives. We don’t realize that our creative capacity is fundamentally important to doing something the matters in the world.
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The Importance of Play
“It is a happy talent to know how to play.” – Ralph Waldo Emerson
I’ve been reading way too many child-rearing books recently. It’s comes with the territory of being a new mom and wanting to give your child every advantage in life. With all the advice I’ve read, one that strikes me as particularly solid is to foster your child’s creativity and problem-solving skills through free play. No one tells you what to do. You simply use your imagination and the environment around you as inspiration. There are no ribbons to be earned, no goal set at the end of the day. Just have fun.
I thrived on free play during my own childhood. I grew up in a rural area with a large back yard, plenty of toys, and enough siblings to start a basketball team. I spent time outside – pretending to run a restaurant, re-enacting my favorite cartoon scenes, and mucking around in the dirt. I spent time inside – constructing elaborate societies with colorful ponies, tracing the same pictures over and over onto lined paper, and trying to beat the high scores off pointless video games. The memories blur together into one happy kaleidoscope.
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Clearing Clutter Opens the Mind
I do a lot of writing about home improvement and environmental issues and one of the most important topics I find everyone can relate to is clutter.
Clutter can be a heavy burden that confines and suffocates. Like the interesting phenomenon of a pet taking on characteristics of its owner when they’re out for a walk, we often take on elements of the mess around us without even knowing it.
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Reclaiming Your Creative Side
Show me a kid who doesn’t love creativity. Show me a kid who doesn’t enjoy making some type of art — painting, singing, writing stories, dancing, playing music or making things with clay.
You won’t find one.
Until life beats it out of us, we naturally find joy in creativity. Then life (a.k.a. confused grown-ups) tell us we are or aren’t good enough.
You hear that your picture of a cat doesn’t look like a cat. You notice the teacher got excited about Johnny’s singing voice but didn’t seem as thrilled about yours.
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How to Overcome Fear & Let Your Creativity Flourish
“The greatest barrier to success is the fear of failure.” – Sven Goran Eriksson
When you are happy you are confident, and you make choices that give you a better chance at success. When you procrastinate and resist change, that’s fear taking over.
It’s difficult to pull up that creativity anchor and let the “happy you” set sail.
Your fears are just trying to protect you from emotional pain. It’s self-preservation.
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