Building Daily Creative Habits
Ways to Fill Your Creative Well - A Guide
Hi there and welcome to Creativity and Creative Expression,
I hope you found the last article, Why Creativity Matters useful. Don’t worry if you missed it, drop over here to catch up.
Today I want to jump into how you can build creative habits.
We all have incredibly busy lives, which just seem to get more demanding and I realised that there’s probably a few people out there who could do with some support building some good creative habits, despite having less and less time to do the things they want in life and feeling stressed, busy and overwhelmed.
The wonderful Dr Eric Maisel calls this ‘creating in the middle of things’.
It’s very easy to let creativity take a back seat when the demands of everyday life take over and infest into every aspect of our consciousness, or so it can seem.
Believe me I completely get it.
I’ve sometimes found being creative in any way shape or form nearly impossible - my mind full, my thoughts a jumble and the stress and anxiousness leave no space for creativity in my business, writing or crafting spaces, which leads to more frustration.
Some days it’s incredibly hard. I have, however, found building creative habits really useful in combatting this, and I have one trick to make them super easy to fit into your life (more on that in a minute).
When life gets too difficult to hold onto creativity it’s important not to feel guilty about it. This is a big one and the one I find the most difficult to do. I have to work on this a lot.
Most people are way harder on themselves than they would ever be to another person, but if we give in to this guilt and let it swallow us completely, we’ll go through life never getting around to the things we’re truly passionate about.
So, what’s the answer?
There’s a few techniques I use with my coaching clients (and with myself) to help make things easier when things are tough.
What are Creative Habits?
Creative habits are small actions done intentionally to help keep your creative energy well filled up and flowing. They’re usually things that you find inspiring and fill up your energy levels.
For me, I love nature. I find watching waves on the ocean, walking in a forest, in fields and hills are huge creative battery chargers. I love crafting, crocheting, playing with colour and light, photography, and so many other things that fill my creative well.
For others it might be things like journaling, brainstorming, sketching, swimming, talking to people, mind mapping, travelling or some other way that boosts creative energy.
Creative habits are when you do the things that give you energy on a regular basis. To find yours, you first need to look at what things drain your energy and what things boost your energy.
Once you’ve got to this place you can then start considering how to incorporate that into daily life. So, for me, I don’t always have time to go out into nature, so I listen to the sound of the ocean, rainstorms, or other sounds that will help fill up that well.
You’ll probably find there’s a few big things that fill you up and a series of smaller ones.
Why They Work
By consistently doing things that fill up your creative well, you’ll not only find more creative energy, but you’ll also be more relaxed and happier as you rewire your brain for creativity, which will build self confidence in your creative ability. Think of it like a cup/glass of your favourite drink if you let it run dry, you don’t get the enjoyment and benefit of it, but if it’s constantly being filled up bit by bit, you will never run dry again.
Steps to Create Habits Yourself
1. Start small
Don’t try and go too big too quickly. Instead try a five minute daily activity that appeals to you and you know you can easily make time for.
2. Pick a trigger
This is my trick of the trade, one that will make life so much easier. Link this new habit to something you’re already doing regularly. So, you could be listening to your inspirational music on the way back from the school run, mind mapping while you’re drinking your morning tea (or coffee) walking the dog round the scenic route to get into nature, etc.
3. Make space
Do your habit in a regular space or at a regular time. Do you sit in a particular chair each day, walk the dog at the same time each day, drive to work at the same time? Use this space and time to create your habit. This will make your habit that much easier to do if it’s linked to a space or time you’re already using.
4. Track progress
If you like lists and charts try a habit tracker or journal to celebrate small wins. We’re all children at heart and still love a gold sticker for our chart when we’ve done well. So, make that inner child happy and allow yourself to feel those small successes, it’ll give you the motivation boost to keep going.
One Last Tip
Over the last five years I’ve had a real problem with my own creative well. It’s been very empty and I’ve been hopelessly blocked and struggled massively. I’ll go into the reasons for this in a different post, but I want to share with you today the things that have helped me break through this.
By focusing on creative habits, I’ve found that it’s really allowed me to start slowly filling up that creative well. You see, before I did creativity coaching and NLP life coaching training, I was convinced that I needed to just push through it, to force myself to just get on with things and the creative energy would come.
It didn’t.
Instead, I ended up frustrated, annoyed and guilty with myself and my progress.
After learning that my brain is a finite resource and I only have so much space to go round, I discovered that if it’s filled with too much stress, worry and self depreciation, there’s no space left for creative energy.
I now think of my brain like the food cupboard.
If I fill my food cupboard with that random jar of chicken sauce no one likes, then another and another until the cupboard is filled with loads of jars everyone hates, and yet I’m still trying to force some nice jars of food in there too, they won’t fit, the cupboard is full to burst. In other words, if you’re like I was - filling my head with stress, worry, anxious thoughts and letting them take over the space, there’s no room left for the good stuff, so we engineer a way to make room for the good stuff.
Essentially we take out those jars and allow some space for other things.
I’ve been trying different techniques to help and the one that I’ve found works for me is called Morning Pages. It’s a concept from Julia Cameron, in her book The Artist’s Way.
Essentially, you start every day writing three pages of anything at all. They’re not meant to be used or read by anyone at all, they don’t even have to make sense. Instead, it’s about getting those thoughts and information out of your head so you’ve got room to fill up that creative well.
I’m taking out those jars of horrid chicken sauce and giving myself space to add in the nice food.
I have made some variations to this for my own personal situation. I don’t do this as soon as I wake, I tend to do it once everyone has left for school and work, because it’s quiet and I can think. I do like to do it before I start working.
But, most importantly, what this technique has done is break the cycle of five years of blocked creativity and allowed me to start writing again and now to help others too.
Try some of these techniques yourself and let me know if they work for you. I’d love to hear about your experiences.
And, to help you start building some good creative habits I’ve got a freebie for all my subscribers. My Daily Diary and Gratitude Journal can be dowloaded free from my website with the code in your welcome message when you subscribed.
It’s a resource I created for myself when I couldn’t find what I wanted anywhere else, but I’m sharing it with you guys free, as honestly, it’s too good to keep to myself.
In it you get:
- Daily diary space for appointments, notes, to-dos, etc
- Space for three daily gratitudes, so you can help fuel happiness in your life
- Space for three daily affirmations, so you can help manifest all the things you’re wanting to build
- Undated pdf so you can print as many times as you want indefinitely
- Did I mention it’s totally free?
If you didn’t get the welcome message when you subscribed, or you’ve lost the message, drop me a dm or email and I’ll get you sorted.
What’s one creative habit you’ve always wanted to start but haven’t yet?
Drop a comment or send me a message and let me know what’s holding you back?
Remember every baby step is still a step forward.
Don’t forget to praise your progress, no matter the pace.
Next time I’m looking at self-coaching and giving you some tips on self healing and creativity. Plus, I’ll let you know what kept me blocked for nearly five years.
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