We all have a creative bone in our body
What is it that you do to exercise your creativity? Before you say that you don’t have a creative bone in your body, pause to consider what it is that you do that allows your thinking mind to turn off for a minute while you simply create?
One of my daughters colors by number. The other builds Legos. My husband figures out how to make his fly look the most like food to wily trout. My friend makes simple, lovely cards. My brother and my dad would arrange elaborate set-ups for their Lionel trains. I make meals and make small patches of ground prettier than they once were in the garden.
Perhaps creativity is at its most creative when it doesn’t have a point
What you do doesn’t have to involve art. And it doesn’t have to result in a giftable or even Instagram-able product. It doesn’t even have to be useful. Can you imagine doing something just for the joy of doing it? Kate Bowler, Duke Divinity professor, author and podcaster, tells the story about her son’s creative pursuit being a huge hole that he is digging in her backyard. What you do will probably seem more useful than that does.
Our world is so focused on productivity that it can feel countercultural to invest time and energy into taking a creative break. But when we don’t take these breaks, we get so tired that attention is scarcely possible. When we take creative breaks, the parts of the mind that were so hard at work paying attention get to rest and relax. In her book, Waiting for God, French philosopher, Simone Weil, encourages us to “press on and loosen up alternately, just as we breathe in and out.”
Perhaps the point of creativity is that it changes us
University of New Mexico assistant professor of neurosurgery, Rex Jung, offers a scientific explanation for why “loosening up” is important. When the brain is being creative, it allows a freer interplay of different networks in the brain so that ideas can link together more readily.[1] This must be why it so often happens that we have our most creative ideas during the pauses we take in our days to do something else; when we give our mind a break from pressing on and allow it to loosen up for a little while.
It is interesting to me that the opposite can also be true. Sometimes, when what we are working on is creative, we get stuck and need to pause. In these instances, our breaks can be filled with regularly scheduled life. Many times, I have been working on an essay (another creative outlet for me) and feel deep in my guts that something is there, but it is just out of reach. I’ve learned with time and practice that slamming away at it determinedly rarely helps. What does work is to set it aside and go about my day. The next morning, or the morning after that, when I re-read it, the missing piece will shimmer into view – often inspired by something that happened in my life.
Your life is subject enough for lifetime of creativity
Which is a point worth highlighting – your creative fodder does not need to come from your imagination (which can feel rather daunting). In fact, the truest inspiration will most likely come from your life. Live your life attentively. No matter what basic thing you are doing – mowing the yard or dusting the living room or driving to the pharmacy – look and look again. With a mind that is practiced in both pressing on and loosening up, surprising and meaningful ideas will appear before your attentive, curious eyes.
Wait patiently. The idea you seek will come.
Whether what you’re working on is something creative or a regular daily task, taking a break can transform your process. Your pause can be the difference in allowing your idea to be born rather than wrangling it into existence. Think about that for a second. You cannot force birth. It happens on its own schedule. What if we could approach both our work and our breaks with this in mind?
Simone Weil wrote, “we do not attain the most precious gifts by going in search of them but by waiting for them.” While you wait during your break, your attentiveness will be enlivened by the change in focus. Your patience will not be taxed because you will be enjoying yourself. All the while, ideas will come together more freely because you have shifted gears into your creative mind.
However you decide to spend your next break – doing something as silly as seeing how big a hole you can dig, or as meaningful as writing a song – know that it is well worth your time and energy. Stay curious. Stay excited! You will often be completely surprised about what is born when you allow the breath of creativity into your process.
In his third chapter of the sutras, called Vibhuti Pada, Patanjali offers a list of siddhis or psychic powers that may (or may not) occur with steady practice (YS 3.17-34). One of the reasons for offering this list is the lesson that these cannot be achieved or striven for. If they show up, he seems to say, it is grace; keep practicing. If they do not, all that is to be done is to keep practicing – which is to say, keep showing up for your work and your breaks from work. Something amazing may happen – but it absolutely won’t if you don’t show up.
[1] https://onbeing.org/programs/rex-jung-creativity-and-the-everyday-brain/