How to Overcome Struggles with Creativity
Some mornings you wake up with creativity flowing through your veins…and some mornings when you wake up you don’t feel a thing. That usual spark of need to do, to act, to create just isn’t there. Some mornings turn into two, then a whole week rolls by with your camera gathering dust and that blinking cursor pestering you at the end of an unfinished paragraph in your latest story.
Some mornings it doesn’t feel like it’s worth it to crawl out of bed.
I’ve been there, we all have.
With an overload of school work keeping me off of the trails and away from my stories, the slow slog back and forth between work, school, and home burns out that desire to ‘do’ in me.
Getting home well after dark I no longer have time for quiet afternoon adventures walking through the woods, or skipping stones across a mirrored lake. My weekends are often spent in front of my computer doing homework, even when the sun is sprinkling its magic between the leaves and the landscape is just beckoning to be hiked in.
The more trapped I felt in this spiral of work and school life, the less I desired to do the things I once loved. Feeling unlike myself, choosing a quiet moment to sit after a stressful week rather than a moment to create, to see, to be in nature, I acted on what wouldn’t fulfill me.
Don’t let that happen to you. Every spare moment you get, take a moment and think about what you can do for yourself, what you can do for your own happiness. Spark up that creativity by never saying no.
Take a deep breath, take a moment for yourself.
Getting home late from work or class, I hurry inside to eat and get out of my clothes. Don’t rush, look up at the stars as they burn to life above you. Give yourself a moment to just appreciate their wonder. Don’t lose sight of the beautiful things around you.
The other weekend I was overburdened with work, but a photography meetup was going on in Vermont. I was worried I wouldn’t have enough time to get things done for the following week, but what I should have worried about was helping myself.
I went, sparking the creativity in my being with new, friendly faces and stunning sunsets.
That moment helped push me through the week, drive me through to the next weekend.
Even if moments like this don’t arise, and you find yourself struggling to write down words for a new story, a new blog post, keep at it. Giving up after you rewrote that first sentence twice isn’t good enough. It’ll take an hour of staring at your computer or notebook, and fifteen revisions to get it right, but eventually you will.
It’s like working the pump on an old well. At first, it’s dirty, and the water flows like sludge out of the tap, but if you keep pumping, keep failing, eventually pure, clean water stars to flow again.
That’s where I fail; I give up too soon, don’t stare at the inked words long enough. Don’t let it come down to that.
Push harder against the forces that hold you back, you’ll thank yourself in the end, even if at the time your mind is too weary of the fight to think it.
