- Increase Your Creativity: Identify Its Number One Enemy
When we think how to improve or increase our creativity, often we tend to look at the things we COULD DO. - Creating A Life That's Right For You: Are You Living By Design or Default?
We all have many different areas and elements that together make up our lives. But are the ones that make up your life right now there by design or default? - Creative Day Jobs: How to Support Yourself While Pursuing Your Creativity
There are few creative people who are able to pursue their artistic and creative talents whilst earning a reasonable income from just them exclusively. - Struggling to be More Creative? How to Truly Make Space for Creativity in Your Life
Have you ever tried repeatedly to bring certain new things into your creative life, only for them each time to be ineffective or short lived? - Creative Compliments and Creative Criticism: How Attuned is Your Hearing?
The average human ear can hear sounds in the frequency range of 20 Hz - 20 kHz, from deep low bass to sharp high end treble and all frequencies in between. - Creative Pleasures - How To Enjoy Your Creativity Three Times as Much (at Least!)
How much do you enjoy your creativity? How aware are you of the different phases of creative pleasure? And how many of them are you truly appreciating? - Ditch That Negative Mental Baggage! How to Increase Your Creativity by Travelling Light
Imagine that every time you went anywhere - whether it was to work, to a friend’s, to a restaurant, to the shops – you had to gather up all the possessions you had and take them with you. Every time. Everything you own and have collected over the period of your life, all bundled up together and taken along for the ride. - Creative Heroes: Enrich Your Own Creativity by Learning From The Creative Heroes You Admire
Consider this hypothetical question – If, from birth, we were never exposed to any form of creative influence whatsoever, would we be more, or less creative and original ourselves? - Creative Individuality: Embracing, Celebrating and Enriching Your Creative Uniqueness
Whilst all forms of creative expression can be categorised into a particular medium or movement (and those that can’t simply invent and define their own), and anyone who creates has their pioneering predecessors and forefathers, nevertheless we are all different and unique. - Creative Success: Defining Your Personal Vision For YOUR Creative Life
The pressure to "be a success" is possibly greater these days than in any time previously in human society.
And it’s not just success in one particular field or area of our lives. There’s an expectation for us to achieve in all things - to be a wonderful parent, a supportive friend, a good son or daughter, a groundbreaking artist AND a community minded member of our society to name just a few. - New Perspectives: Increasing Your Creativity and Imagination Using the Art of Reframing
As creative people, we can, ironically, at times be very un-creative in our ways of thinking. - I'm Not Sleeping I'm Creating! How Sometimes LESS Activity Equals MORE Creativity
Some people just sit at their desks and stare at a sheet of paper; others pace around. I personally like to lie flat on my back, with my eyes closed. A scientist working really hard may look very much like one who is taking a little nap.” - Your Creativity Portfolio: How to Invest Wisely and See Your Creative Assets Flourish and Grow
Years ago, the investment options in the financial world were fairly limited, and the best way to save and invest your hard earned money came down to a choice - Revealing Superman's Secret: Isn't It Time You Ended The Pain of Hiding YOUR True Creative Identity?
Many creative people, those who are recognised as having creative or artistic careers - actors, painters and authors for instance - wear their creativity openly like a big shiny badge proclaiming that yes they are someone for whom creativity is a central part in their life, and a major part of their identity. - When I Was A Child – How Creative Freedom of Childhood Can Help Us Increase Our Creativity Today
As creative adults, for many of us one of the most difficult aspects of creativity is allowing ourselves the freedom to experiment and to be pioneering in our own way as artists. - Running With Stones in Your Shoes – Little Irritations That Can Become BIG Drains On Your Creativity
Picture the scene. You’re an internationally renowned marathon runner, lining up for your biggest race of the whole season - The London Marathon. The competition is fierce.... - Supercharge Your Creativity: The 5 Power Questions to Ask Yourself
Questions are one of the most powerful tools we have available to us. A great open-ended question can be the key to unlocking a whole undiscovered thread of ideas, reaching a fresh new insight on an old familiar issue, and understanding some part of ourselves and our creativity in a different way.Here are 5 "Power Questions" to ask yourself to illuminate the inner workings of your creativity, and as a result give you a new level of awareness and surge of motivation - Creative Day Jobs: 7 Key Reasons Why A Creative Day Job Can Be Great For YOUR Creativity
Whatever your creative talents, and however much you nurture them, the chances are, like the majority of creative people, you’re not able to make a full time living through them.Here are 7 of the top reasons why a creative day job can, more than being a financial necessity, actually be fantastic for your creativity in a variety of different ways - - How Much Is Enough? Becoming At Peace With Our Creative Output
Creativity can be elusive and complex to describe, and we all have slightly different ideas of exactly what it means to us. - Creative Support - How Supporting Others' Creativity Naturally Supports Our Own
Often it’s during the periods when we don’t feel supported ourselves that we’re most sensitive to, and aware of, what's missing, and we’re able to provide this for others.Somehow our compassion and empathy is heightened and we give more spontaneously and willingly the type of support we crave ourselves.It's by reaching out and supporting others that we can quickly feel better ourselves. And by helping other people improve their lives for the good, we also feel good. It's a simple equation. - Increase Creativity: By Developing The Curiosity Habit
As creative people, one of the simplest and most powerful things we can do to develop and maintain fulfilling creative lives is to develop positive habits.The “Curiosity Habit” is one of the most useful and productive habits we can acquire to increase and support our creativity.It adds to the breadth and depth of our understanding and experience, and the richness of our lives and our creative output.Here are just some of the ways the “Curiosity Habit” can be adapted and used most effectively - - Overcoming Creative Resistance: The Lesson of the Dragon Slayer
Something all of us who are creative have in common is experiencing internal resistance to our creativity or creative flow.Time and time again we try to eliminate the dragons - those negative thoughts and doubts of resistance - from our minds, which usually results in much anguished and exhausting mental gymnastics and leaves us slumped defeated, and more often than not giving up on our creative efforts altogether.But, there is hope. You see we don’t have to try to be dragon slayers, there is another way - Enjoying the Creative Journey: Are Your Dreams Already Around You?
Sometimes, we can have our sights so firmly set on our goals in the long term future that we overlook what we’re currently experiencing, and all the situations, opportunities and potential happiness that we’re actually right in the midst of.So think about your own creative life. What parts of your life right now actually are much better than you realise, or give yourself credit for achieving? How are your dreams already amongst you? - Creatively Stuck? Try Sitting With The Silence
As creative people, the position of being stuck for ideas and direction is unavoidable, and one that we’re all faced with now and again, for however short a time it lasts.But if we can let go enough of the maelstrom of fears and ideas in our thoughts and truly listen to what the creative project is asking for, we’ll find the answer often leaps out and becomes quite obvious.Here’s how - Creatively Run Down or Unwell? Call Your Creativity Doctor!
Most of use when we feel unwell or out of sorts in some way, will seek some kind of medical help, traditionally from our local doctor or General Practitioner.But who do we turn to when our creativity feels sick or unwell? There’s no “Creativity Doctor” for us to make an appointment with. Or is there..? - Don't Debate, Just Create! How To Stop Hitting The Snooze Button in Your Creative Work
If we stop to analyse and debate whether the time and conditions are right to create, we can ALWAYS come up with a host of reasons NOT to create. Here's an alternative approach. - 7 Sure-Fire Ways to Kill Your Creativity - And How to Avoid Them...
There are many ways we can kill our creativity and severely limit our ability to naturally create the projects we have the talent and desire for. - How To Supercharge Your Self-Confidence Using Your Natural Creativity
Great self-confidence is something that everyone can benefit from developing. - Creating A Life That’s Right For You: Are You Living By Design or Default?
We all have many different areas and elements that together make up our lives. But are the ones that make up your life right now there by design or default? - You Always Get What You Focus On… So Focus On What You Really Want!
What do you focus on and spend most of your time thinking about? The things you want in your life? Or the things you don't want? Whatever it is you focus on, that's what you'll find will appear in your life. - Creative Immersion Sessions - The Joy of a Long Hot Soak
From time to time, it’s important totally immerse ourselves in a creative project without distraction, even for just an hour or two. Getting back in touch with what it feels like to be totally connected and in the flow of our creative energy, can rejuvenate us in a way that lasts long after the experience itself is over. Here’s how to make it as easy as possible. - Overcome Creative Block: When The Best Creative Work Is Not Just In The Words
When we get creatively stuck or blocked, as well as feeling unable to go forward with the work and the anxiety and fears that this creative paralysis can bring, what’s perhaps even more unsettling is how all we’ve created so far starts to seem a little less shiny and glowing.Just a day or two of feeling creatively blocked like this can change our perspective hugely and we begin doubting whether a single sentence in our novel, brushstroke on our canvas, or note in our composition are of any use at all!Sometimes though, the solution and the way through such creative blocks is not in the words, the brushstrokes or the notes - Increase Creativity: The Invisible Threads That Hold Together A Creative Life
What is a dressmaker without any thread? All they'll have is a collection of odd shaped pieces of material, unconnected and unwearable.So what are the equivalent "Invisible Threads" that hold together our creative lives and how do we make them as strong as we can, and as supportive of our creative work as possible? - Creative Authenticity: What's Your Biggest "Project in the Closet"?
All of us who create have "Projects in the Closet", the meaningful, powerful and potentially life changing work we secretly long to create but don’t for some fear or other.But what’s the cost of NOT working on these projects? How does it compromise our integrity as an artist to continue to deny and ignore these major works of great personal meaning?If we were to pass away without having even attempted to begin work on them, how would that fit within the image we have of ourselves been honest and truthful and leading a fulfilling creative life? - Creativity Secrets Revealed: The Best Place to Start Your Next Creative Project
When we consider where to begin on our new creative project, the sheer number of different possible decisions and options we’re faced with can halt us in our tracks. This kind of intense overwhelm has been the undoing of many a potentially great creative work.If only we knew the best place to start, we could get on with the creating and putting all our energy and effort into the project itself!So where IS the best place to begin? What's the secret of those who create rewarding, stimulating, meaningful projects time after time? - Increase Creativity: New Creative Wardrobe - Where Would YOU Start?
Sometimes we're so caught up in the routine of life, we overlook the actual individual parts our creativity is made up of, the various garments hanging in our creative wardrobe.We undervalue our favourite, best fitting and most flattering clothes - those unique powerful elements that allow us to be the creative individual we are.Also we underestimate the draining impact that negative elements - the dowdy, wrong sized, dust gathering garments - can have on our creativity over time.So if you had the chance to rebuild YOUR creative wardrobe from nothing, what would you want to put in first? - Increase Creative Self-Belief: Overcoming The Danger Of Negative "Snap-Back"
When we do something new in our creative lives, something different and outside our normal state and range of behaviour, initially we may just go with it, experiencing a mixture of feelings of fear, trepidation, challenge and excitement.Pretty soon though, little by little, habit by habit, the doubts and negativity creep in and we begin to "snap-back" to old patterns of thoughts and feelings.So how can we break free from this limiting cycle of behaviour avoid reverting back to our previous safe levels each time we step out of our comfort zone and get closer to realising our full potential? - Enjoying The Creative Process: The Tale of Two Culinary Perfectionists
My partner and I love cooking together. It's something that we both value and enjoy in our lives, from the choosing to the preparing, the cooking and finally the eating. But we didn't always appreciate it as we do now. Here’s what used to happen, and how it relates to how you enjoy YOUR creative processes- - The Most Beautiful Shape: Letting Your Creative Work Find Its Most Natural Form
Some of the most famous inventions and artworks in history came as a result of their creator trying to create one thing and discovering something completely different as a "happy accident."Yet still we often have such fixed ideas of what our creative work "SHOULD" be that we lose the ability to let it fulfil its own potential, and take its own beautiful natural shape, and end up frustrated and feeling like we’ve failed to fulfil our original aims - Creative Health For Life: Why Short Term Crash Diets Don't Work!
As with new exercise and diet plans, most of us begin new creative projects with great enthusiasm and energy. But very soon, the motivation appears to evaporate and the momentum we began with feels too difficult to maintain.So what can we do? How can we maintain the impetus and momentum we gain from those first few days of a new project? - Increase Creativity: How To Achieve Your Creative Goals
By believing that fixed pre-conditions are necessary for our happiness, and then finding they never quite arrive when and how we expect them to, we set ourselves up for much frustration, procrastination, even anger, and can trigger off spirals of negative inner thoughts and criticism.Here's an alternative approach to finding, and then achieving, YOUR creative goals. - Creative Support: Are You "Reaching Out" But Not "Letting In"?
As creative people, many times we may feel that unless we go it alone and create with any outside help or support from others, that somehow we’re not being "truly creative". If we allow any outside input or influence in, it may corrupt and tarnish our inspiration, flow or muse. Then even when we accept we do need support, there's a way to go before we actually allow people to give it, and further still until we let it have a positive effect on us- - Creativity Defaults: How Are You Unknowingly Limiting YOUR Creativity?
What would you say if someone suggested to you that you were greatly limiting your creativity and creative output without realising it, every single time you come to create?Each time you settle down to create, are your creativity default settings - both internally and externally - set up to enable you to create as easily and freely as possible? - Increase Creativity and Achieve Your Creative Goals: Putting Flesh On The Bones Of Hope
The bones of your creative life are the goals, aims and ambitions you have for your creative work and your creative development.Putting flesh on these bones is where you plan how you're going to get there. It involves simply breaking each creative goal on a timeline into clear steps.Read on to find out exactly how to apply this to your creative life - Creative Perfection: 5 Reasons Why We Destroy Our Creativity By Trying To Achieve The Impossible
Whoever you are, whatever your preferred creative field there's one absolutely, so-sure-you-can-bet-your-house-on-it, way of ensuring you wear your creative energy down to nothing, and pretty much completely destroy your current creative motivation, possibly for ever.PerfectionismOften, perfectionism isn't actually the reason we don't create at all, it's just a convenient label to mask other fears.So here are just some of the most common faces of perfectionism and some alternative ways of considering them. - Creative Success: The Razor Thin Line Between Achieving And Not Achieving Your Creative Ambitions
Creative Success is so much closer than you realise. In fact it's just one simple step away.It's on the other side of the same razor thin line that's the difference between success and failure, achieving and not achieving, in any other area of life.So what is this one single crucial element? - Creative Perfectionism Is A Killer Disease: Here's The Miracle Cure
What is the one single thing that more than anything else stops us from creating?The disease that kills creative projects dead, saps creative energy like a swamp full of starving leeches and can destroy a previously healthy and productive creative artist in hardly any time at all?Read on to find out what it is and how it can be cured - Being More Creative: What's YOUR Story About Why You Don't Create More?
Each of us also holds dear a special kind of story.Or more accurately, a collection of stories, our own little pocket anthology.These aren't stories based on our own past exploits, events that have actually happened and we can recollect.These are the stories we've carefully constructed and now carry around, about who we are and what we can achieve.So what's YOUR story about why you don't create more? - Increasing Your Creativity - What Would You REALLY Do With A 36 Hour Day?
What would YOU do, if tomorrow a worldwide treaty agreed to change the number of hours in a day from 24 to 36?At first you might think:"Fantastic! That’s exactly what I need. More hours in the day will allow me to work more on my creative projects and increase my creativity. I'll now have time to fit in all the daily necessities, then have time left over to be more creative. What a great idea!"But what if you soon found that actually lack of time wasn't the main factor in stopping you from being more creative? - New Ways To Create - 5 Ideas To Help You Experiment, Liberate And Reach Beyond!
Whatever medium we’re creating in, it can be easy and very productive to get into a strong flow, but also dangerously easy to get in a creative rut.Productivity, and finding the methods, environments and routines that work well for our creativity is one thing. But becoming a human photocopier and churning out almost identical pieces of creative work time and time again is something else entirely.Anyone who’s committed to progressing and evolving creatively must be prepared to experiment.So here are 5 quick ideas to give YOU new ways to create: - Increase Creativity- Become A Highly Charged Creative Lightning Rod For New Ideas
If we are to be more creative, and have more creative ideas, we need to adopt some of the properties of a lightning conductor. We must find ways to attract ideas and let them flow to us and through us with as little resistance as possible. Here's a great way of putting this into action- - Unleash Your Creativity - 3 Powerful Ways To Capture & Grow More Creative Ideas
The nurture of new creative ideas can be difficult.Once we get a few creative ideas recorded and growing, before we know it there's another and another, and soon we're overflowing with more ideas than we know what to do with.The more creative ideas we have, the more we seem to have, we've just got to get the cycle going.So here are 3 powerful ways for YOU to capture and grow an abundant flow of creative ideas: - Unleash Your Creativity And YOU Can Change The World
As individuals, however creative we may be and however much we want to change the world around us for the better, it's easy to feel disheartened and powerless. "How can I alone make any difference, I'm only one person out of billions"? many of us regularly ask ourselves. Well, the greatest gift you can offer the world is your full true creative self. And you may be helping to change the world already in more ways than you realise- - Be More Creative - 7 Reasons Why Everything You Create, Perfect Or Not, Has A Valuable Purpose
Trying to be absolutely perfect in every detail with everything we create is an easy habit to get into.The fact is, whoever we are, everything we create WON'T be perfect. - Creative Evolution - Letting Your Creativity Flow Naturally Without The Feeling Of "Selling Out"
It's natural and healthy as creative people to want to be on an upward spiral of our own personal creative evolution.When this spiral of creative evolution begins to change from simply steadily moving onwards and upwards, into wanting every creative project to be an exquisitely perfect work of unparalleled creative genius, that’s where the problems occur.How often have you felt that by not following the original plan for a creative project that in some way you’re selling out or letting yourself down? - Increase Creativity - How To Become A Creative Gardener & Nurture Your Creativity For A Full Harves
As creative artists, there's much we can learn from our outdoor loving, horticulturally passionate colleagues Here are just a few tips on how you can become a better Creative Gardener and see your Creative Garden give an abundant crop season after season: - Creativity Is For Life Not Just For Workshops! 3 Top Tips
Picture the scene. You've just returned from a weekend break away, a creative retreat. You've enjoyed the weekend immensely and come back feel more energised and in love with life and your creativity than you have done in years.After a few days (or even hours!) back in your normal world though, the events and impositions of daily life start to take grip on your creative work again, and the red hot spurt of motivation you experienced has become more of a lukewarm trickle.What happened? Why didn't the creativity and the energy last?Well, creativity is for life, not just for workshops. Here are 3 top tips how you CAN maintain that creative energy in your daily life, not just the occasional weekend: - Writer's Block - A New Perspective To Help You Overcome Writer's Block
Writer’s block, or creative block to use a wider reaching term, is one of the most common issues with writers and other creative people. Creating in this frame of mind feels about as easy as if we were trying for the world 100m breast stroke record in a swimming pool of thick treacle. So changing our fixed perception of writer's block is a major step in feeling less fearful of it and experiencing it less often. Read on to find out more - Permission To Create - Why The Gateway To Your Creative Dreams Is Always Locked
Do you find in your creative life that you keep coming up against the same old stumbling blocks? Whatever your approach, time and time again you get so close to your creative dreams - and the creative life you truly want - before somehow falling short of the target? In fact, all that's stopping you from moving closer to your creative dreams can be summed up in a single word. Read on to find out more- - Unleash Your Creativity-7 Ways YOU Can Tap Into The Unstoppable Flow Of Your Inner Creativity Today
How often in YOUR life do you truly unleash your creativity?How often do you feel that you’re creating as naturally and fully as you’re able, where ideas and action all flows easily and freely?It’s very likely that you’re not creating as often, or as fully, as you'd like to be.So here are 7 simple ways you use to can tap into your inner creativity today: - Unleash Your Creativity - How Listening To Yourself Can Help You Be More Creative
Listening to yourself can help you be more creative.So what does this mean, listen to yourself?You may feel you've heard all you have to say to yourself about your creativity. Maybe you find most of it often comes out as pretty negative and unconstructive comments.But have you truly LISTENED to your creative self?Here's how to start today - Unleash Your Creativity - How Giving Yourself Time To Learn Can Help You Be More Creative
Giving yourself time to learn and develop can help you be more creative.The only way we can truly learn, develop and evolve as creative artists, and as human beings, is through experience, through trying out something, seeing what works for us and what doesn't, then doing more of what does work, and less of what doesn't.It's OUR creative life, we can make a deal with ourselves when we start each new project as to how it’s going to be, and how we will approach it, so it's as fulfilling as possible.To make this easier, focus on these 3 key elements: - Unleash Your Creativity - How Getting Yourself A Cheerleader Can Help You Be More Creative
Creating can be a lonely process and it's all too easy to stuck in a tangle of our own thoughts and lose perspective and focus. Before we realise it, our minds can feel overloaded with a combination of negative doubts and inner criticisms, and about as organised as a plate of spaghetti Bolognese thrown against a wall. So something of great value is having someone to be your cheerleader. Your cheerleader in this sense is simply someone who will encourage and support you and your creative work. Here's how to pick a good one for you… - Unleash Your Creativity - How Finding The Right Creative Environment Can Help You Be More Creative
Finding the right creative environment can help you be more creative.If we try to give ourselves fully to creating when all around is chaotic, noisy and distracting, we're not likely to produce much creative work that we're happy with or that highlights our creative potential.We're simply not giving ourselves a fair chance.So here are the two main types of creative environment that can help us, and how: - Unleash Your Creativity - How Chunking Down Your Creative Projects Can Help You Be More Creative
Often, as creative people we're highly ambitious with our creative projects, and have ideas for vast far reaching work that'll change our world, and touch the lives of many others. This is all fantastic and gives us plenty to aim for. But then what usually happens right after is we expect to go from having the initial ideas to completing the project in a couple of days, a completely unrealistic timescale. The alternative is to "chunk down", break the project down into manageable chunks and approach them one at a time, building momentum as you go. Here's how this helps increase creativity and why- - Unleash Your Creativity - How Rewarding Your Creative Achievements Can Help You Be More Creative
We nearly always find it easier to acknowledge and give praise to the creative achievements of other people, and stand in awe at what people accomplish in their creative lives.How many times have you found yourself thinking "Wow, I wish I could be as creative as they are" ?When it comes to our own creative achievements though, most of us suddenly developed an acute blindness to the bare reality.So here are two simple steps to rewarding our creative achievements, and therefore helping us increase our creativity: - Unleash Your Creativity - How Creating A Little Each Day Can Help You Be More Creative
Creating a little each day is quite probably more powerful and fundamental to a highly enjoyable and rewarding creative life than any other.It's the key and the cornerstone to producing wonderful creative works over and over again, and growing and developing our creativity to new levels as we do.So here's how, in 5 simple steps, you can apply the technique effectively in your creative life: - Who's The True Creative You? 5 Questions To Help Unlock Your True Creative Self
All of us in our everyday lives have to play a number of different roles, and put on a variety of personas. Different parts of life require different abilities to come to the fore, and similarly, different people bring out different parts of our personalities.But, when you come home at the end of the day, and are able to remove all the various hats, relax and detach from the expectations of the various roles you play, who is it you're left with? Who's the true creative you?Here are 5 powerful questions to help you get closer to your true creative self
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