Five Things I've Learned About Creativity
This has been the year where I've really started to find my creative feet. It's without a doubt a lifelong journey, but these past twelve months or so is when I've really discovered what feeds me creatively and what the work is that I truly want to be creating. Here are just five little things I've learned about creativity this year:
It Needs Feeding, But It Never Runs Out There's this constant fear when you're a working creative that your best work and ideas have already come and gone; I can't tell you how many times I've sat down to brainstorm content and felt like I just have nothing left to give. A huge thing I've learned is that creativity never runs out; we're all capable of inspired and interesting ideas, the trick is to always nurture our own creative skills and stay open to inspiration when it comes our way.
Judging Other Creatives Work Never Makes Ours Better I feel so lucky to be a part of this awesome online community full of inspired and talented creatives. Criticising other creatives and bloggers and how they create can be rife online sometimes, and I truly believe that competing with others and judging their work will only hold us back from creating awesome work of our own. If we put negativity out into the world we're therefore also bringing negativity into our own lives - Lauren shared a super insightful post recently on 4 Productive Insights on Competition and Comparison that is a must read. Just because something might not be to my personal taste I still try to always support fellow creatives and respect their work, and keeping your eye on your own work instead of judging others, in my opinion, is the best way to create work you can be proud of.
Surround Yourself With Creatives Who Inspire You Ever heard the quote; if you're the smartest person in the room, find another one? Being surrounded by creative friends and peers who inspire you, push you to do better, and open you up to a whole new way of seeing things is so important when pursuing creative endeavours. We're not meant to live life alone, and working solo can sometimes be super lonely and isolating and having an awesome group of both offline and online creative friends is one of the greatest joys of my life.
Act Before You’re Ready This is a huge lesson I've learned this year, as so many creatives I respect have shared this advice in one way or another; act before you're ready. There's only so much behind the scenes planning, building, and brainstorming we can do; sometimes we just have to share our work/project/product with the world and learn by doing. If we wait until we're ready, we'll never actually ever feel ready and this year I've learned to embrace the discomfort that can come with trying something new and instead appreciate the importance of sometimes just taking a leap into the unknown.
Practice Makes Perfect I don't know about you, but I'm never good at something the first time I try it. Or even when I feel like I've mastered something, six months down the line I look back and see how far I've come since then. We're always learning, growing, and moving forward, and honing your craft every single day is the only way to become great at it. I write every day, and I'm always discovering new ways to craft words and prose to connect with an audience and share what I want to say with the world. When I first installed Photoshop a few months back I was completely overwhelmed at how little I knew; fast forward to now and I'm currently using it to design my first ever digital product and I wouldn't have been able to if I hadn't practiced every single day and learned new skills little by little.
What about you, what have you learned about creativity this year?
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