Ready to Set Your Creativity Free?

Does it feel like your creativity is locked up tight in a box you are afraid to open? You put it in there long ago when your third grade teacher didn't like your drawing or your father disapproved of you wasting your time writing poems or your grandmother told you that you didn't have as good a singing voice as your sister.

It happened to me in junior high school when my in my design class the teacher exclaimed about a drawing I actually really liked, "Suzanne, you can do better than that". Decades later I've yet to pick up another drawing pencil. The creative self is a tender and vulnerable part of us, so it doesn't take much to discourage it.

I could have left the creative urge locked up with my drawing pad but fortunately I found other outlets. In college I developed a passion for black and white photography for creative expression. It was a fine replacement for drawing. Eventually creative writing became my main form.

I was lucky enough to grow up in a city, San Francisco, and with a parent, my father, who valued the arts so I wasn't weighed down by the general cultural beliefs that the arts and creativity are frivolous. I had implicit permission to play with creativity from early on and it informs my life in countless ways.

Back before I started my own writing and creativity coaching business and needed a resume to apply for work, the line that got me the most interviews was "creative problem solver". My relationship to creativity allows me to use the process to access the field of all possibilities so that I can come up with new ways of looking a situation and new solutions.

We all have this capacity. I just was lucky enough to grow up in an environment that age me permission to play with it. Whether you know it or not you probably are using this ability to some degree on a regular basis. You've all had the experience of trying to solve a problem at work using your rational, linear mind. Frustrated to give up and let it go, you drive home and as you pull up to the house the solution pops into your head. That's one way the creative process works. You learn to trust that if you give a problem over to your subconscious the answer will show up.

So to reclaim your creativity, to set it free, consider the ways you are already creativity in every area of your life and the benefits it brings. How have you been discouraged over the years from being creative and what action could you take today to begin to reclaim those gifts. Play with the idea. Have fun. That's the heart of the creative process. Joy and a deep sense of satisfaction.

The Power of Commitment and Practice

Until one is committed, there is hesitancy, the chance to draw back, always ineffectiveness concerning all acts of initiative and creation. There is one elementary truth, the ignorance of which kills countless ideas and splendid plans; that the moment one definitely commits oneself, then providence moves too. All sorts of things occur to help one that would never otherwise have occurred. A whole stream of events issues from the decision raising in one's favor all manner of unforeseen events, meetings and material assistance which no one could have dreamed would have come their way. I have learned a deep respect for one of Goethe's couplets: "Whatever you can do or dream you can, begin it. Boldness has genius, power and magic in it. Begin it now!" - W.H. Murray The Scottish Himalayan Expedition

Whether its for writing, meditation, exercise, or anything you want to do but feel resistance to, establishing a practice can help you move forward in magical ways. It signals to the universe that you are committed. Having a practice means that you show up every day, no matter what. You are going to want to release all expectations of outcome or where you think you want things to go. It doesn't matter how good you are or what you accomplish or what happens with the practice. You sit down to meditate and your mind goes wild with chatter the entire time, that's fine. You show up to write and find yourself whining on the page, that's okay. The point is to show up and practice.

A lot of things are happening when you show up consistently to something. You begin to forge the neural nets in your brain needed for the task and strengthen them so that whatever you are committed to actually becomes easier to do and you are able to increase our level of skill. In writing your subconscious mind is working 24/7 on whatever you give it to focus on, so showing up everyday allows you to access new insights and ideas arising from your expanded mind.

You commit and take the action. The universe responds in kind, to the power of your willingness and the force your commitment. Free from expecting that you need to accomplish something, you relax and open up to allowing. In this receptive state, the your subconscious mind aligns with the workings of the Universe and you find support, synchronicities and inspired ideas coming to you.

Establishing a practice helps you move beyond any resistance that has been in the way. When you release the need for instant gratification you slip into a sense of satisfaction from the simple act of showing up for yourself. You learn to find joy in the practice itself and this allows you to expand your creative capacity.

To begin, start small. When I coach writers who are having a hard time showing up, I ask them at first to commit to writing ten minutes a day. This helps you cross the threshold of resistance and move past the associated voice that tells you that you don't have enough time. Once you have established the habit of showing up you will find things flowing with greater ease.

Nature and Creativity

When I received the inspiration for the name of my business Creativity Goes Wild I was on a modern day vision quest in an extraordinary canyon in southern Utah that allowed me to really open to the flow of new ideas. Along with the name, I also got that the essence of the work included three different elements: Nature, creativity and the soul which are aspects we can connect to that can really help us live full and authentic lives.

I have long thought of nature as the original artist. If you spend any time in nature and pay close attention, you become aware of the beauty and design and patterns in both small things like the symmetry in pine cones and snowflakes or on a grander scale the patterns in the erosion of mountains or the movement of clouds across the sky.

At first glance nature might look chaotic or random or disordered but the more you observe and learn about the natural world the more you become aware of the elegance of design in every creation. We can draw inspiration for our own creativity from spending time in Nature, the same way we feel inspired by visiting an art exhibit, going to a play or watching a good movie.

Spending time in nature actually slows down our brain waves, taking us from the beta waves where our mind attends to daily activities into alpha waves which offer a naturally meditative state where we access the part of our mind that has new thoughts and ideas, flashes of insight, and more readily makes connections. This can help us with the essence of the creative impulse and process.

Whenever I find myself stuck on a creative project I will go for a walk in nature and it always opens me back up to the flow. Or if I am looking for a place to begin a creative work I will plant the seed in my subconscious mind and then go to nature, not to think about it, but to allow the inspiration to rise to the surface of my mind.

Try it. Whether you like to sit in the garden or go for a walk among the trees, see if you don't find that connecting to nature doesn't open you up to new ideas and possibilities.

The Power of Creating in the Moment

Be Here Now - Ram Dass

Boredom is a sign that you are not being present. - Eckhart Tolle

I find myself, more and more, really called on a deep level to live in the moment; letting go of all worry about the future or regret about the past and to trust. Mystics have long encouraged us to be present to each moment, each breath. And now quantum physics tells us that in the moment exists all of time: past, present and future. This explains why the moment or the Now is the only place we are able to create anything, a book, a painting, a solar panel, our life. This is where are are able to create a new world for ourselves on both a personal and global level.

The more you practice being in the moment the easier it is to create. Our breath is a greatest tool since it calms our mind and relaxes our body which makes it easier to be present to what is. If we are worried about the future we can take a deep breath and ask is everything okay in the Now. The answer almost always is yes. When we calm our mind we have greater access to the guidance and wisdom of our own deeper knowing and inspiration can flow in.

My two greatest teacher for living in the moment have been creativity and Nature. What I have always loved about being creative is that it automatically makes you present to the moment and something greater than your everyday self. Whether I am dancing, doing photography, singing or writing there is a joy and satisfaction that arises out of showing up and being present to what wants to happen. When you hit the zone or the flow it feels so good. It feels Divine. I have a similar feeling in Nature where everything, rock, plant and animal is clearly in the Now being the essence of what they are meant to be. This helps me to just be.

Like many of you I've have done a lot of personal growth and healing work seeking to transform old patterns into new more satisfying and abundant ways of being with myself and the world. Recently I've felt a real shift in this and have come to the realization that there is nothing to fix. That nothing is wrong. If I embrace and accept everything in the moment free of judgment then things naturally shift and I am more open to new possibilities. Experiences that I deemed challenging are from the vantage point of the moment the experiences my soul needed in order to reach this point of understanding. When we live in the moment we have access to the wisdom and intuition that comes from our hearts.

A few days ago when my mind started to run away with me and the tools I usually use to calm the flame of worry didn't seem to be working I was guided to simply stop, take a few deep breathes, drop into my heart, and claim being in the moment. Peace immediately washed over me and clear sense of the next right action to take came to me.

We think we have to think through problems, that we have to figure everything out with our minds. Instead if we connect to our own inspiration and guidance in the moment we allow solutions to come intuitively and we experience synchronicities and miracles, little and big. In truth, the moment is the only place we can connect to higher wisdom and knowing. This is true for our creative projects as well as the course of our lives where we find ourselves living in the flow. This can help us be more actively creative on a daily basis.

Imagination Can Transformation Our World

Imagination is more important than knowledge.
- Albert Einstein

Imagine all the people living life in peace . . .
- John Lennon

Consider that your imagination is real. It is a creative force. Our bodies can't tell the difference between an actual event and one that is imagined. If you have a fear of heights and lean out over the railing to look down on the Grand Canyon your body will begin to feel a sense of panic, dizziness and butterflies in the stomach. Close your eyes and imagine the same scene in detail and you will feel the same visceral reaction to a fear of falling.

With the world in tremendous flux we have an opportunity to create a world of peace and harmony that works for everyone. "Just pretend" that it is possible. "Just pretend" is another way of saying" imagine", because when we use our imagination we feel we are just making it up and that it has little to do with "what is real". But what if imagination is more than that. What if through the force of imagination we can be the creator of our lives and our world. What if now is the time. What do you want to create for yourself, your community and the world at large. You can start with "just pretend" to begin to access your imagination and deeper knowing.

Start to see what you want in your mind's eye or feel it in your body. It can be as simple as I am the experience of joy, love, and freedom from the place of your heart. What would that look like for you? What is calling to you from that place of your heart and your joy. What do your want to choose. What we put our focus on is what we create. Intentionally using your imagination for creation helps you focus on what you want and bring it into being. Imagine we can all be the agents of transformation in the world. What would that look like?

Here's a poem by Rainer Maria Rilke (likely the great spiritual poet of the early 20th century) that feels to me like it was written for just the time we now find ourselves in.

All will come again into its strength:
the fields undivided, the waters undammed,
the trees towering and the walls built low.
And in the valleys, people as strong and varied as the land.
And no churches where God
is imprisoned and lamented
like a trapped and wounded animal.
The houses welcoming all who knock
and a sense of boundless offering
in all relations, and in you and me.
No yearning for an afterlife, no looking beyond,
no belittling of death,
but only longing for what belongs to us
and serving earth, lest we remain unused.

- Rainier Maria Rilke

Imagine how you want to serve the Earth, how do you want to be used.

Creativity is Critical to Our Well Being

Expressing our creativity is as vital to our well being as a healthy diet, exercise, fresh air and sunlight, and a good night’s sleep. At this point in our history, embracing our creativity is also essential to the well being of our world.

Just as deep conscious breathing infuses our body to healing energy, when we are creative there is a vital life force energy that moves through us that enlivens our body and spirit. The word inspire, meaning to breath in or inhale, originally referred to taking in spirit or divine truth. When we are inspired to be creative we connect to a source greater than our everyday self, we feel expanded and present in the moment. When we repress our creative urges It actually hurts.

The good news is that all of us are already much more creative than we think. We know that it feels good and uplifting to play with our creative ideas and impulses. The idea that we are not creative, is simply a story we bought into somewhere along the way, often from our schools and society at large as well as the people close to us who didn’t consider themselves creative.

To embrace our creative self we need to let go of what we think creativity is. We need to be willing to let go of control and let the flow carry us. There are infinite ways to be creative. Make something, dance more, doodle, play with an idea or project without attachment to outcome, question everything. Ask “hey can this be done a different way” or “what else is possible here”.

Getting creative with how we ask questions can expand our possibilities. Rather than asking how do we fix climate change, ask how do we live in harmony with the earth or how do we bring more love into the world. Expanded questions invite creative solutions.

When we feel our spirit inviting us to be more creative we have to be careful that we don’t let our mind talk us out of acting on the ideas and intuitions we receive. Living from our minds has us on autopilot drawing only on what we know from the past. To embrace our creativity we need to be willing to understand less and play and intuit more.

What if the challenges we face in our live and the world today are an invitation to be more creative. To allow this medicine for our heart and soul to feed our overall sense of well being and creative positive change in our worlds.

How Do We Bring More Love to Our World

I don’t think any of us will question that these are tough times that can leave us feeling a bit helpless to have a positive, creative impact in our lives and the world. If we view the world solely from our rational mind, we limit our understanding to what has happened in the past or what we think might happen in the future. We limit our connection to the grace available in each moment and to the potential for miracles. We limit our capacity to love our world.

Science now shows us, based on a study of the earth’s magnetic fields done by NASA, that what we hold in our hearts radiates out to the whole world. It turns out that our hearts have a magnetic field five thousand times more powerful that the one generated by our brain and it is in communication with the magnetic field of the earth.

This means holding love and appreciation in our hearts and feeling it going out to people and places in need actually has an impact. We can do this for people on the other side of the world from us, people in the midst of natural disasters, those in front of us in the line in the grocery store as well as to the earth herself.

I have a great fondness for tree squirrels and sometimes hold my affection for them in my heart and send that love to people and places in need. Recently I was doing this while sitting in my car in the park. I notice a gray squirrel loping in my direction and watched him come right up under my window, sit up and stare straight at me, as if to say, yes! So find what works for you. Play with it. I was delightfully surprised by what felt like squirrel love.

Our heart’s connection to a larger field of awareness may explain how we know things beyond our mind’s ability to understand how we know. We just know. We feel it in our gut, in our bones. This voice of our intuition or inner knowing that doesn’t make sense to our mind.

We tend to let our minds talk us out of the guidance that comes from that kind of knowing because it takes us out of our comfort zone into the unknown. Yet now more than ever we need to tap these expanded capacities for creative problem solving and innovation to be the change for our own lives and the world. We can to bring our heart felt love into our own energy field and the field of the world.

Looking for Inspiration in Unlikely Places

Recently on a trip to the Montana mountains, where we spent a week camped near a river that slowly snakes through a broad meadow, I noticed a pair of baby ducks who were clearly without their mother. I walked down to the water several times a day to check on them and was always relieved when I found them actively feeding and looking to be in good health.

I have been interested in birds since I was a teenager and enjoy simply watching them. The more I watched these two ducks I was startled to realize that they were two different species, two very different kinds of duck. One was clearly a diving duck as it keep arching it’s body down into the river in search of food. The other was a dabbling duck incapable of diving, feeding instead on the pondweed and aquatic insects floating on the surface.

I have never seen anything like these two orphaned ducks so different yet so a home with each other. They never strayed more than a few feet from each other’s side. Baby ducks instinctively have a strong urge for the sense of safety in being part of a flock and they had somehow found each other to satisfy that need.

It occurred to me that nature was offering me a wonderful example of creative problem solving and inspiration for how we human may benefit from forming unlikely alliances in these challenging times. The ducks reminded me of the importance of letting go of how we think things should be and opening to being surprised by new possibilities.

This really is the heart of creativity, a willingness to play outside the box, to try new things and imagine new ways of being. Since this experience I have found myself more open to conversations with strangers who I might have previously perceived as quite different from me.

Along that same river I spoke with a stock broker from Chicago who has been fly fishing the region for 40 years and has a deep commitment to the environment. I met a rancher from South Dakota who is on a treasure hunt with his daughter and grandchildren, who explained that the directions to buried treasure was left in the form of a poem that, to my amazement, he recited by heart.

Being more open allows for more inspiration to flow into our creativity as well. I am finding it’s enriching my life in wonderful ways and new ideas keep popping into my mind. So try this. Consider the ways that you can be more open to unexpected inspiration and play with it. See if it doesn’t bring more joy to your life.

Why Does Being Creative Feel So Good?

Why should we use all our creative power? Because there is nothing that makes people so generous, joyful, lively, bold and compassionate. - Brenda Ueland

Why does really engaging our creative power feel so good? It brings us into the moment. It brings more of our heart, soul and spirit into play. We are allowing the forces of creation to move through so we feel uplifted and inspired. We find we can do more that we thought we could. This isn’t just about creating art but creative action and problem solving in all its myriad forms.

We have all had the experience of being a work trying to solve a problem with the limited capacities of our mind. Finally we give up in frustration, get in the car, drive home, and as we pull into our driveway the solution pops into our head. We have a sense of ah…ha. The uplifting feeling that bit of magic was at work. Where did that come from we might stop to ask if we weren’t so happy to have an answer. That’s how creative inspiration works. We need to allow for it, rather than try to force it.

When we experience this flow of creativity, whether for a moment or for hours we feel as if we have touched the heart of the universe, something bigger than our everyday selves. There aren’t really words to describe it. We just know if feels good and expanded. This applies whether we are writing a poem or designing our garden, cooking without a recipe or anything where we are doing something in a new way.

You can begin to play with expanding your creative capacities by looking for ways you already feel creative or things you feel drawn to and play more with those. Let go of thinking you aren’t creative or that you have to good at it. Better yet, ask your creative spirit what she would like, let the question go, watch what pops in and follow that lead.

See if the act of bringing more of your creative power to your everyday life doesn’t help you feel better about yourself and the world.