Creative Expression: How to Connect with your Creative Energy
How do you connect with your creative energy? Do you feel the flow during certain activities? Do you have to create the conditions with intention? Do you allow yourself to find it in fun new ways? Or do you have one thing that works for you and works well, that you turn to whenever you are in need of creative release? So many questions come up when I think about creativity and how people use creative expression in their lives. Perhaps the role of creativity is more uniquely present for me since I have been a creative my entire life and have carved a place for myself in the world utilizing creative expression as my medium. Even in my personal life, I often fail to remember that many people don’t spend their evenings singing at the piano, doing interpretive dances in their living rooms, editing YouTube videos, or rehearsing for musicals. Yet, this is what I choose. This is what makes me feel alive. This is my creative world.
But what of the real world, you ask? Eh, it’s there. I am not devoid of responsibilities. I like to save admin work for Fridays because Friday is ruled by Venus. It’s a good day to deal with money and people with generous and positive energy. I’m not very good at executive function but the more I practice I feel confident that by the time I’m fifty, I may be a responsible adult. I do have surprisingly good organization skills when I want, which helps me be highly efficient with my day job or when I’m producing a show for my local theatre or something, but the majority of the day my mind is wandering. It’s searching for inspiration floating around in the ethers, as Liz Gilbert describes in her book Big Magic. I should have a better creative routine, but I lack a structured mind. My busy multi-passionate brain gets infatuated with certain ideas for a while, then after I’ve explored and played around with them it moves on to something else. So one day I won’t be able to stop thinking about photography and the next I’ll be at my computer writing a new chapter of my book like a mad woman. I try to allow my intuition to guide where my energy will best be spent when it comes to my creative projects, so every day could be very different depending on what is calling to me. But it does get in the way of my productivity sometimes. Yes, that word again, productivity, always showing up and making us feel bad about ourselves. But why?
Creators on the internet are constantly showering us with methods to boost our productivity, telling us we won’t be successful if we don’t create and post a billion things every single day, and setting bars so high many of us give up a week after we start trying because it’s just so much. Overwhelm and fatigue are so common for creatives it seems to be the crux of why many of us end up keeping our creative selves small. We want to play in the local band, we want to audition for that play, we want to create online content, we want to write that novel… then we don’t. I can’t speak for everyone, but in my own case, it’s partly because I’m scared to be seen and partly because I don’t think I can keep up with the needs of full-time creative living. We can’t all quit our jobs and devote 8 hours a day to our craft, and even if we tried, would we last?
I can’t answer that question, but I can say that what I try to do is keep following the inklings of my heart and my body telling me how I can connect with that creative spark within myself every day. I may sit in a short meditation where I set the intention to connect with my creativity and ask where my creativity can best be used today. Then I usually get ideas. I try to listen to them even if they are brief. They may be for a new scene in my book, a song I want to practice, a TikTok or Youtube video I can film, a new dish I want to try and cook, or a craft I want to make- you get the picture. Giving myself some freedom to explore allows that spark to stay alive, and then sometimes a spark takes root and I discover in them something fully formed that was just waiting for me to bring it into the world. And that motivates and drives me to give actual focus and intention towards the projects that I passionately want to pour my creative energy into until I have made something new and important. When I make a video I do it because I’ve decided that my message is important to share, and even if it takes me three months to put together, I will keep coming back to it until it’s done. And the feeling I get when the product is finished is so good, so nourishing, so exciting, that I know I’m doing the right thing with my creative energy. That’s what my life as a creative looks like. I don’t post content every single day and I don’t feel bad about it. I create what begs to be created whenever it finds me. My creativity is not a machine, it is a garden full of flowers that break through the soil and grow slowly and steadily until they are ready to bloom. The flowers in my garden take turns blooming. All of the roses don’t open at once, sometimes there are daffodils or tulips that pop up beside them and demand the sun’s rays only fall on them for a time. A garden is created through a cycle of creation and rest. The beauty of my garden is that it doesn’t always have to be in bloom, but when it is, I can share in its beauty with others and it will have done its job, and I will be satisfied with that.
Keep listening to the ideas that whisper in the breeze as you walk by. Search for the sparks that will lead you to something lush and fertile. You can’t force a garden to grow, just tend to it and eventually, it will bloom.
I recently made a video based on this blog for my Youtube Channel. Check it out below and give me a follow if you’d like to keep up with my videos on slow living and creating an intentional authentic life.
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