* Show up
* Trust yourself
* Shut up!
Show Up
Show up. That’s all. The most important part of any task, creative or otherwise, is simply to show up. By “showing up”, I mean get started on the creative task. The task may be as simple as giving a presentation, or as complicated as writing a book, but if you show up, you can do it. Showing up to tackle a creative task is the hardest part of the project. The problem with any creative task is that you can’t figure out how to do it using the logical left side of your brain. Creativity requires that you use your right brain; your intuitive self. The left side of your brain, the analytical logical side, doesn’t trust the right side. It doesn’t want to relinquish control. This means that it’s very hard for most of us just to sit down and start.
There’s a simple way to sidestep this problem. Acknowledge that are two modes of perception, left brained, and right brained, and that your right brain will perform the creative task. “Perform” is exactly what your right brain does, when it’s presented with the creative task. Discovery—as you watch your creative self perform— is one of the joys of creativity. You never quite know what’s going to develop. It helps to add a little humor to this situation. Think of your right brain as a personal assistant, your VP of Creativity. Show up, and direct your VP to perform. If you want more information on brain modes, check out the free online creativity course.
I learned that showing up works when I started writing. To write a book, you have to sit down and write it. You may not know how to do it, but do it anyway. Write down a word, and then another word. By the time you’ve written five or twenty words, you have a sentence. Keep on showing up, sitting down and writing another word, and before too long you have a chapter. It’s taken me almost twenty years, but I realize now that showing up is really *all* that’s required.
Trust yourself
Have faith that you can do whatever creative task is expected of you.
You can’t do it alone, however. Any creative task requires your subconscious mind/ right side of your brain. This intuitive, non- verbal part of you will add inspiration to the task. We spend our lives in the left side of our brain, and it’s often difficult to believe that we even have a right brain, much less trust it to perform a task. (See Show Up above.)
Having faith basically means getting into the right side of your brain at will, into an alpha mind state. We’ll discuss mind states in upcoming chapters of the online creativity course.
Shut up!
Shut up! Stop labeling, analyzing, criticizing… stop chattering, and pay attention.
Creativity demands a fresh way of seeing, a fresh understanding. However… we already have a way of seeing creatively, and this is direct perception.
To access direct perception, we need to turn off the constant mind chatter we indulge in. What’s direct perception? It’s seeing/ understanding, without analyzing. An example: let’s say that you’re having an argument with someone. The person insults you. Knowing it’s an insult, you fire up. At this, she tells you that you misunderstood what she said. Your direct perception tells you that you were insulted. You saw the angry look in her eyes, and heard her tone of voice. However, you don’t want to believe that someone would deliberately hurt you, so you decide to believe the words, rather than the evidence of your eyes and ears.
Creativity demands that you turn off your mind chatter, and pay attention to your direct perception.
Copyright 2002 by Angela Booth
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