What nurtures creativity?
Start with prayer. I want to talk about morning pages and artist dates. And about paying attention. About how guilt and bullying are horrible motivators. Love and curiosity and play, those are good. WONDER. Listen to your natural rhythms. Be disciplined, show up to the work when you don't feel like it, but don't bludgeon yourself.
Art feeds art. Watch, read, listen to good things.
Being outside, reading good things (Bible included) are endless sources for material. Just living life, interacting with people. Let yourself feel things, notice things. Let yourself get angry, or be delighted, or inquisitive.
Pay attention to your anger, your jealousy, and what it's telling you.
Be careful who you allow to be a critic in your life. Write out all the things people may have said, or the attitudes you may have encountered, that paralyzed or disempowered or invalidated you. The things that made you feel guilt or confusion or fear. Then think about truth you can use to counter them. Maybe other, positive things people have said. Or the truth you have trouble believing about God and the nature of things, like how God is a Creator and made you to create. Creativity delights His heart. Artists can be sane and solvent. Artists can have healthy relationships. What so-and-so said about your poem or painting, etc., doesn't define you and may not be true at all. Just because your work wasn't the best in the class doesn't mean it's junk or that it doesn't matter. Even if your work always gets praised, it may not be great art, and you still need to practice. You don't live for praise.
Consider your job like that of an electrician (thanks, Mark Potter!). You're not Prometheus or a prostitute. People aren't here to worship your brilliance. Nor are you here to be their slave and pander to their whims. You're here to see what they need, and do something about it as only you can. Be a prophet. Speak the truth. The beautiful truth, and the difficult truth. Notice. Pay attention. Imagine what's possible.
Start with prayer. I want to talk about morning pages and artist dates. And about paying attention. About how guilt and bullying are horrible motivators. Love and curiosity and play, those are good. WONDER. Listen to your natural rhythms. Be disciplined, show up to the work when you don't feel like it, but don't bludgeon yourself.
Art feeds art. Watch, read, listen to good things.
Being outside, reading good things (Bible included) are endless sources for material. Just living life, interacting with people. Let yourself feel things, notice things. Let yourself get angry, or be delighted, or inquisitive.
Pay attention to your anger, your jealousy, and what it's telling you.
Be careful who you allow to be a critic in your life. Write out all the things people may have said, or the attitudes you may have encountered, that paralyzed or disempowered or invalidated you. The things that made you feel guilt or confusion or fear. Then think about truth you can use to counter them. Maybe other, positive things people have said. Or the truth you have trouble believing about God and the nature of things, like how God is a Creator and made you to create. Creativity delights His heart. Artists can be sane and solvent. Artists can have healthy relationships. What so-and-so said about your poem or painting, etc., doesn't define you and may not be true at all. Just because your work wasn't the best in the class doesn't mean it's junk or that it doesn't matter. Even if your work always gets praised, it may not be great art, and you still need to practice. You don't live for praise.
Consider your job like that of an electrician (thanks, Mark Potter!). You're not Prometheus or a prostitute. People aren't here to worship your brilliance. Nor are you here to be their slave and pander to their whims. You're here to see what they need, and do something about it as only you can. Be a prophet. Speak the truth. The beautiful truth, and the difficult truth. Notice. Pay attention. Imagine what's possible.
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