Sit down. Breathe. Stop thinking so you can start thinking. The mind gets cluttered. With everything. So much of everything it ends up being nothing. How do we latch onto our creativity when our minds cannot access that reservoir? For the creatives, we are persistently and perpetually aware of that well. We are as aware of that space as we are the grumblings of our intestines and the sensation of clothes on our skin. But it is an awareness that must be shelved for later. When there is time. But our creativity is like an eager toddler, a curious kindergartener, an infatuated lover. Our creativity wants more, wants us, wants our attention. See me, play with me, be with me. Now. We can ignore it. Stifle it. Neglect it. And we all know the horrors of the orphan, abandoned in some neglectful place, unloved, never held, never soothed or touched with kindness. That infants will still grow but it will be antisocial, unattached. It may not speak. It lacks empathy for others. The small child that is delayed and postponed can pitch a fit. Be oppositional. Defy. Repeatedly test the boundaries. Demand attention, even it is for all the wrong reasons. And that lover we ghost? They leave. And we lose that intimacy.
Creativity is the same. It must be nourished. Embraced. Attended. It demands total focus and presence and it knows when you’re distracted and half-listening.
This isn’t about quantity, although the more time your devote to nurturing creativity, the more vibrant and robust it becomes. Its that 10 year or ten thousand hours equation. Do it more. Do it often. You develop expertise, style, finesse. It gets easier. Second nature. Like walking. Or riding a bike. Or baking a loaf of bread. Do it enough and it is nearly automatic. Do it more.