I'm a little lost creatively.
I have ideas. Good ones. Ones that make me excited. I just can't seem to focus on them long enough to get anything down.
I started this blog almost a year ago to help hold me accountable in my writing. When I blog, I think writing. I think images. I think creativity. I think--period.
Besides my own version of writer's block, what's kept me from my writing? We've gardened. We've done a short road trip to a family gathering. We've indulged in a 'stay'cation while N was counselling at camp.
It is summer and I won't beat myself up. After all, enjoying sun, water, and fresh produce is part of what summer is all about.
It is just that I like being productive. I like making a difference. I like thinking I could have a future as a well paid author. And I know school and all its responsiblilities is lurking just around the corner. There is still much to prepare for our last year as homeschoolers.
I am a creative soul. There is just not much evidence of it lately.
Until I focus, my ideas are going to sit like a lump of Pottermom's unworked clay. Waiting for a shaping hand and creative mind to form them into something worthwhile.
I wonder, does clay go stale?
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5 Other Creative Souls are Saying:
I don't know about clay, but I DO know that YOU could never go stale. I think these slumps are about life rhythms, creativity waxing and waning in rhythmic phases. I think summer is a time for you to fill your soul, replenish yourself, and then in the fall, in the harvest phase, we'll all be blessed with the fruit of your season of rest and growth. I find great value in relaxing into the natural rhythms of life.
Beth
Deb - it will come, but it can't be forced. Summer should be a time of relaxing without commitments (not that I'm experiencing it myself - but it should be that way).
Clay doesn't necessarily go stale but it:
1) grows mold if it is left unused and closed up
2) gets hard if left unused for too long or exposed to air.
But the good thing is... clay is easily redeemed.
Just mush it up, add moisture, knead it until it's pliable and you are ready to go again.
Much like creativity. You can let it sit and rest for a while but with a little effort it become quite perfect for use. In fact you can let clay completely dry out and then just crush it into a powder... add water and pow! instant clay. So letting your creativity dry up doesn't mean it's gone, it's just in a different form.
I think all creative people have periods where being creative is slow and sometimes non-existent. Don't worry about it. I'm sure you'll start creating again soon.
Deb,
I ran across this quote today and thought of your "lost" blog. May it inspire you:
"The creation of genuine art demands conscious struggle, formal inventiveness, and reckless courage.
We make out of quarrel with others, rhetoric, but of the quarrel with ourselves, poetry. The creative artist must be open to an unknown power that fills him. S/he must be able to draw strength from a source s/he doesn't understand or know."
W. B. Yeats
~Becky
What Other Creative Souls Are Saying