Monday, February 15, 2010

Taking Time to Capture Your Ideas

DIPPING INTO YOUR WELL OF CREATIVITY

If you're out of touch with your inspired self, making a date to reconnect with that part of you opens the window.

Inspiration comes quietly. If you have to sit in front of your computer screen and look out the window absent-mindedly for an hour or two, don't worry. That's as it should be because its the sitting at your computer knowing you are going to write that gives your creativity permission to resurface. This is the time you've picked. It's going to happen, sooner or later.

And you must sit there tomorrow at the same time, for the same length of time, and the next day and so on, and so on, even if you don't write anything.

You'll begin to notice what your inspirations are, where they come from, what about them excites you. Then you must find a way to capture them. Many creative people keep journals of their insights and ideas. This is not a dairy of every day activities. This is a place to put your musings.

Chronicling your awarenesses, meandering thoughts and feelings gives them value and signals to your inner self that your creative process is getting attention.

Time is absolutely vital to your creative self. Sitting and staring isn't unproductive. Most writing happens while staring out the window. Don't berate yourself for day-dreaming. You're dipping into your creative well.

What is writing after all but putting your dreams to paper?

4 comments:

nephite blood spartan heart said...

I have volumes of notebooks I scratch down all my daydreams and seedling ideas in.

It would take anyone else decades to rifle through and make sense of it (a'la Christpher Tolkien) but I find it invaluble to come back to for ideas on projects that need a kick midway.

Wade Burch said...

I make notes and bookmarks constantly.

It would help if I knew where I put them.

=/

Jennifer said...

I carry around a notebook or my laptop at all times, always taking notes on what I see, hear, smell, taste, touch, feel, think, and everything else. Sometimes my notes develop into stories and sometimes they don't, but it always helps me open my mind for writing time.

Great post. :)

Anonymous said...

I keep a notebook with me at all times. Sometimes I need to refill my creative well with movies or books or sometimes just a quiet walk.