If you have been following me, you may be aware that I am now fully self-employed. This means that I have complete freedom to indulge in creative outlets.
I have learned many things through this creative lifestyle, so I have compiled my top seven tips for creators! This should help you grow as a creator as well as unlock the creative genius inside of you.
1. Get used to confronting your fears
Creating is all about jumping into the unknown! As long as you live a life based on avoiding your fears, you will struggle to be present with all of yourself. In turn, your creations will be limited because you will be creating with only some of your consciousness/awareness. Instead, practice letting your fears come directly to you without needing to judge them or fight them off. If you do this, you will start to expand your conscious awareness. This allows you to establish a better connection with your creative (dream) self.
Remember, suppressing your fears is the same as suppressing your creative genius.
2. Explore the "bad" parts of yourself/your creations
Creating meaningful creations depends on your ability to "feel" deeply. However, we tend to suppress our feelings by only seeking out "good" feelings and avoiding "bad" feelings. This creates a dualistic awareness, or an awareness that perceives life in extremes. This awareness focuses on "black" and "white" instead of the colors in between. In this way, it becomes obvious how limiting this can be on your creations (as well as your enjoyment of life itself). You may experience a distorted perception of reality as well as general numbness.
If you explore the "bad" parts of yourself mindfully, you will find that they were never bad. They just seemed bad after years of avoiding them. Furthermore, those parts of yourself will expand your consciousness and allow you to create more meaningful creations.
Remember, the part of yourself that you judge the most is also the most creative part of yourself. All of your judgments of the "bad" are also judgments toward your creative genius!
3. Challenge your limitations!
Creative blocks are common for all creators, and they are caused by attachments to seeing/doing things a certain way. These attachments limit both your creativity as well as your life itself! Therefore, it is especially important to be living a lifestyle that constantly challenges your physical, mental, and emotional limitations. Practice releasing beliefs that tell you how you MUST appreciate yourself, how you MUST be, how you MUST feel, etc.
Our greatest limitations place our inner power in our external reality, making us powerless victims of our external reality. To creators, this may look like depending on the validation of others in order to appreciate your creations. When we lose our ability to appreciate our creations on our own, we also lose our drive to create.
Remember, you can appreciate your creations and the process of creation no matter how your creations turn out! Practice creating for yourself, for the joy of creating in itself.
4. Put your heart into it
Finding genuine desire to create can be challenging at times. Sometimes, you may not want to create. Sometimes, creating can feel like a chore or a job. Sometimes, it can feel like you lost the initial fulfillment you first felt when you started creating. Sometimes, you may feel like your art is not good enough no matter what you do.
These are all very common, and they are the result of closing our hearts to our inner child. When we suppress our inner child, we also suppress our ability to enjoy life. We lose the adventurous drive to explore life. We lose the innocent awareness that can appreciate things beyond judgment. We lose the love of creating.
Remember, the love for creating comes from your inner child/heart.
5. Live a creative lifestyle beyond your creative outlets
It can be hard to create anything if you are not living a creative lifestyle yourself. You may expect yourself to explore many different possibilities through art when you live a routine/repetitive lifestyle yourself. Understandably, this results in creative blocks.
Instead, learn to be creative REGARDLESS of what you are doing/creating. You can be creative while cooking. You can be creative while walking. You can be creative while listening to music. You can be creative while working. Find ways to remind yourself that you are a creative, multidimensional being. This is when creative genius is allowed to express itself regularly and ground itself into your physical self.
Remember, what you are doing or feeling does not prevent you from being creative. You can be creative 24/7.
6. Watch yourself as you create
Creating is a very expressive process that can reveal ALL of your fears, judgments, emotions, limiting beliefs, etc. Therefore, it is very powerful to use the creative process as a way to find yourself or to deconstruct subconscious patterns. Personally, I like to use dance to target subconscious patterns, and I work through the patterns while dancing (You can see this here).
While you are engaging in the creative process, you can treat it like a meditative, introspective experience. If you do this, you will surface things from your subconscious while creating, and those surfaced parts of yourself will express themselves through your creations. For example, you can channel your inner child while creating. As your inner child surfaces, you can give it the love that it lacked in its childhood, integrating that limitless consciousness into your conscious awareness.
Remember, creating is for you and the parts of yourself that do not get to express themselves on a regular basis!
7. Share your art with others
Ultimately, art/creation deals with our connection with the beyond. This also means art/creation deals with our connection with others. Share your art without attachment to how it may be received! Inspiration can come from anywhere. Connect with other artists and creatives. Start your online platform/portfolio now. You never know when an opportunity may come across your page.
Remember, creating taps into what is beyond your current perception/conscious awareness. Do not be surprised if your life changes before your very eyes.