Your riff struck such a resonant chord with me. It describes something I’ve been sharing with my students for the past year.
I teach hand building in a clay studio and many of my students are lawyers or scientists or retired or full time moms.
I always ask them why they decided to take my class and what they’d like to get out of it.
The answers range from “just wanted to get out of the house “, to “I tried pottery, couldn’t center, but like clay, so..”, or “I want to do something with my hands. I’m tired of sitting in front of a screen all day.”
I applaud them for getting out of their routines and comfort zones, for taking the chance of not being good at something, at least for a while.
What I want most is to let them know how profoundly important it is to nurture their creativity. Every class I read a chapter of Rick Rubin’s The Creative Act. It’s become my tarot book.
Of course it’s wonderful when I see them excited about a piece they created.
More importantly I do my best to let them see that the joy, along with the courage and curiosity it took to be holding a piece they created - something out of nothing - that joy and wonder can be tapped at any time by nudging the creativity living within them. It’s a beautiful part of what makes us whole, and nurturing it will support anything and everything else they do.
I love playing with and teaching clay. Underlying or running through it is the love, maybe even mission, of getting folks to see how vital creativity is to living a full and meaningful life.
What you’ve added to this is wonderful. The teeth brushing metaphor is brilliant and so accessible. I will most definitely be sharing it with them.
Thank you.
And thanks again for Camp GLP. The time I spent with you and all the other gleepers is such a treasured part of my life.
Hey Evie, love how to you invite folks into creative exploration, and remind them it's about something bigger, too. Your joy for sharing and teaching is palpable!
Up until now, I've never thought of my daily needs as maintaining creative hygiene. But indeed, that's what they are: the long walks in the mountains with our dog, writing diary, even my 10-15 minutes-a-day dedicated to learning languages. It doesn't even matter much which language I'm learning - it's my passion, and also a great practice of learning to think in new, unexpected ways. So, I want to thank you for giving me a new expression: creative hygiene! 🌹 I'll be using that one for sure.
So agree, Virva. I think we just start to do these things because they feel good and give us access to a way of experiencing life more fully. And, as a lovely side-benefit, they also prime the creative pump.
Thank you Jonathan for this excellent piece on creativity. I work with children and they often ask how I can draw the things I do and I tell them that I just write and draw for fun and it gets better with time. I love your suggestions to kick start creativity and I will share them. My go-to practice is recording my dreams, especially the disjointed ones that I can recall. My brain uses all kinds of symbols and simply recording them will render clues, often not right away but later. Dreams are like the sea glass that washes up on the shore of my unconscious and I can collect those gems and use them. It doesn’t happen every day but I have decades of these recorded and they make much more sense now. The key is not to force understanding, it will come.
Love this guidance for kids, Laura. So often, it's about letting go of the striving, and just enjoying the doing. And, so interesting that you record and then "decode" your dreams.
I like to think of a topic, whether in my day-to-day life, or something else, and turn it into a comedy routine. Forces me to think about the topic in unconventional ways. Comedy is all about observation.
Oh, that's so fun, Chris! I've actually thought about taking improv classes, both as a fun experience, and also to help me really tune into what others are offering in the moment.
I think my Miracle Morning routine helps with this, enormously, because I'm clearing the mental decks for the day ahead and also reading stuff which interests me.
Other stuff I do is to go out for solo trips to the cinema, in the middle of the day if my schedule permits, often to see films I wouldn't usually see. A trip to the library and a little wander around the shelves can also help.
Those help to re-fill my creative well, I think!
Love the reframe of calling it 'creative hygiene' ❤️
I also LOVE LOVE LOVE taking a walk every morning and my creative juices start right away too! It's like nature will activate me for problem solving. I consider it my prayer walk and being in nature, especially at the ocean gives me a new and clean perspective!
Nearly a year ago I discovered the Imaginative Storm method of writing imaginativestorm.substack.com developed by Allegra Huston and James Nave. In summary, we are given a prompt (usually a photograph, but can be anything). Set the timer for 2 minutes and write a list of as many words or short phrases as you can think of. If this is part of a writing group, we create a community list where each person contributes 2-3 words. Next, set the timer for 10 minutes. Write about anything using the words in the lists (yours or the community list) or not. Let your imagination run freely. Decide not to judge yourself. At the end, read your story aloud. There is no critique, only support. Prepare to amaze yourself. You may have the kernel of something to develop into a larger project. This has made my writing more joyful and eliminated writer's block. To try it, we meet on Zoom Thursday evenings and Saturday mornings. See the link above for more info. Our 10-minute writings are published on the website to give you an idea of what can be done using this method.
Hi Johnathan.
Your riff struck such a resonant chord with me. It describes something I’ve been sharing with my students for the past year.
I teach hand building in a clay studio and many of my students are lawyers or scientists or retired or full time moms.
I always ask them why they decided to take my class and what they’d like to get out of it.
The answers range from “just wanted to get out of the house “, to “I tried pottery, couldn’t center, but like clay, so..”, or “I want to do something with my hands. I’m tired of sitting in front of a screen all day.”
I applaud them for getting out of their routines and comfort zones, for taking the chance of not being good at something, at least for a while.
What I want most is to let them know how profoundly important it is to nurture their creativity. Every class I read a chapter of Rick Rubin’s The Creative Act. It’s become my tarot book.
Of course it’s wonderful when I see them excited about a piece they created.
More importantly I do my best to let them see that the joy, along with the courage and curiosity it took to be holding a piece they created - something out of nothing - that joy and wonder can be tapped at any time by nudging the creativity living within them. It’s a beautiful part of what makes us whole, and nurturing it will support anything and everything else they do.
I love playing with and teaching clay. Underlying or running through it is the love, maybe even mission, of getting folks to see how vital creativity is to living a full and meaningful life.
What you’ve added to this is wonderful. The teeth brushing metaphor is brilliant and so accessible. I will most definitely be sharing it with them.
Thank you.
And thanks again for Camp GLP. The time I spent with you and all the other gleepers is such a treasured part of my life.
Hey Evie, love how to you invite folks into creative exploration, and remind them it's about something bigger, too. Your joy for sharing and teaching is palpable!
Up until now, I've never thought of my daily needs as maintaining creative hygiene. But indeed, that's what they are: the long walks in the mountains with our dog, writing diary, even my 10-15 minutes-a-day dedicated to learning languages. It doesn't even matter much which language I'm learning - it's my passion, and also a great practice of learning to think in new, unexpected ways. So, I want to thank you for giving me a new expression: creative hygiene! 🌹 I'll be using that one for sure.
Virva from Finland
So agree, Virva. I think we just start to do these things because they feel good and give us access to a way of experiencing life more fully. And, as a lovely side-benefit, they also prime the creative pump.
Thank you Jonathan for this excellent piece on creativity. I work with children and they often ask how I can draw the things I do and I tell them that I just write and draw for fun and it gets better with time. I love your suggestions to kick start creativity and I will share them. My go-to practice is recording my dreams, especially the disjointed ones that I can recall. My brain uses all kinds of symbols and simply recording them will render clues, often not right away but later. Dreams are like the sea glass that washes up on the shore of my unconscious and I can collect those gems and use them. It doesn’t happen every day but I have decades of these recorded and they make much more sense now. The key is not to force understanding, it will come.
Thank you again for what you wrote. Laura
Love this guidance for kids, Laura. So often, it's about letting go of the striving, and just enjoying the doing. And, so interesting that you record and then "decode" your dreams.
I like to think of a topic, whether in my day-to-day life, or something else, and turn it into a comedy routine. Forces me to think about the topic in unconventional ways. Comedy is all about observation.
Oh, that's so fun, Chris! I've actually thought about taking improv classes, both as a fun experience, and also to help me really tune into what others are offering in the moment.
Improv is a blast. I've never had more fun being so terrible at something.
Since you asked about our current practices...
Three verse responses
five seven five syllables
as ‘wow, thank you’ gifts.
Beautiful, as always, Marisol.
I think my Miracle Morning routine helps with this, enormously, because I'm clearing the mental decks for the day ahead and also reading stuff which interests me.
Other stuff I do is to go out for solo trips to the cinema, in the middle of the day if my schedule permits, often to see films I wouldn't usually see. A trip to the library and a little wander around the shelves can also help.
Those help to re-fill my creative well, I think!
Love the reframe of calling it 'creative hygiene' ❤️
I also LOVE LOVE LOVE taking a walk every morning and my creative juices start right away too! It's like nature will activate me for problem solving. I consider it my prayer walk and being in nature, especially at the ocean gives me a new and clean perspective!
Nearly a year ago I discovered the Imaginative Storm method of writing imaginativestorm.substack.com developed by Allegra Huston and James Nave. In summary, we are given a prompt (usually a photograph, but can be anything). Set the timer for 2 minutes and write a list of as many words or short phrases as you can think of. If this is part of a writing group, we create a community list where each person contributes 2-3 words. Next, set the timer for 10 minutes. Write about anything using the words in the lists (yours or the community list) or not. Let your imagination run freely. Decide not to judge yourself. At the end, read your story aloud. There is no critique, only support. Prepare to amaze yourself. You may have the kernel of something to develop into a larger project. This has made my writing more joyful and eliminated writer's block. To try it, we meet on Zoom Thursday evenings and Saturday mornings. See the link above for more info. Our 10-minute writings are published on the website to give you an idea of what can be done using this method.