Search Results for: practical creativity
Practical Creativity: Craft Your Perfect Writing Routine
Routines tend to get a bad rap. They’re stuffy, uptight, unforgiving, and only for the most anal types who wear suits to work and get huffy when things don’t go exactly as planned. But in reality, this couldn’t be further from the truth.
When you design your routine the right way, and take into account your personal style and needs, you can actually boost your creativity and become even more inspired (and say hello to your muse whenever you want).
If your personal brand of writing isn’t creative writing (say, if you’re a copywriter or a journalist), molding your schedule around creativity may seem a bit frivolous. But even the most factual, reality-based writing is still creative at its heart; you need to find a unique, personable way to educate, inform, or reach people using only words, which is an art form in itself.
If you’re a creative writer, you may think that scheduling your creativity is the perfect way to kill it — but that’s true only if you try to force it into a schedule that works against it, not with it. Or you may feel guilty for making getting inspired such a priority. But when writing is your passion (and especially if it’s your career), then your creativity deserves care, focus, and commitment — and the right routine will give it just that.
Practical Creativity: Staying Productive and Inspired Through the Holidays
Ah, the holidays. Whatever your personal beliefs, this time of year is full of nothing but magic, joy, and celebration—all of which will spark your creativity and reward you with a bounty of inspiration.
Or so we tell ourselves.
More often than not, this season is stressful, hectic, jam-packed, and full of endless obligations. (Seriously, how do I need to send so many Christmas cards? Who even are these people?) It’s easy to miss out on the wonder of this time, and even easier to let your own creative projects and goals fall by the wayside.
Never fear; we’re here with five simple tips to keep your creativity and inspiration alive this festive season—and maybe bring a little holiday magic to your productivity and workflow.
Practical Creativity: 7 Tips for Silencing Your Self-Critic
“This article is terrible.”
“You call this writing?”
“Everything you have to say is boring.”
“You’re just not good enough.”
These are the kinds of things you’d expect to hear from a horrible boss, a troll in the comments, or a cruel bully.
Yet too often, these are the kinds of things that we say to ourselves.
We may claim that this way of speaking to ourselves and attacking our writing is useful: It’s just us being realistic and giving ourselves an honest self-critique. After all, Simon Cowell was the best judge, right? So why should we be Paula Abdul, overenthusiastically praising ourselves?
But this sort of thinking isn’t constructive criticism. It’s just, well, mean.
Practical Creativity: Tips for Setting Up Your Ideal Workspace
Creativity is often thought of as something elusive, as something that just happens to you, some passive blessing that gets bestowed on the bemused creator with no warning, logic, or effort.
The image of a creator desperately waiting for the muse, totally at the mercy of its whims, is far too common. And too frequently, we creatives encourage that idea.
How many times do we refuse to paint because “nothing is striking us?” Or refuse to even sit down at our desk because we’re certain we’re crippled with writer’s block? Or leave our guitar to gather dust because we just aren’t “feeling” it right now?