Step Four to Unblocking Your Creativity are Practices
The topic of practices to unblock creativity is closely tied to the previous one on creative rest and to the next one on routines. I’m a big fan of framing activities - especially the ones on this list - as practices because every day and time will be different based on mood, energy, context, time, space and more.
And when we frame these as practices - it is easier for our brains to invite in play, joy, and loads of self-compassion. Practice also gets us out of perfectionism expectations, creating imposterism experiences, and procrastinating due to the previous two limiting beliefs.
Here’s a list of the practices that show up over time and throughout the research and advice-giving books on things to unblock and nurture creativity:
Morning pages - free journaling/writing - I’ve written these for awhile. Read more here.
Nature - gives us connection and perspectives. Read more here on getting out of over-ing and back into intuition through nature.
Somatics - cultivating body awareness and movement - contemplative and exercise
Breath work - cue rest and digest or calms the vagus nerve
Visualizations - imagining or dreaming cultivates neural pathways similar to experiencing
Meditative - actual meditation or mediative like (weeding and walking can do this for me)
Alone time daily for minutes to an hour but it needs to be regular
Environment that promotes creative work time/space
Rituals that cue creative work time
Think of the practices like ‘hacks’ - that’s a popular word these days. One of the hacks to creativity apparently is a good mood because of the part of the brain that is activated then triggers loosely connected ideas equalling AH-HA moments. This finding explains more why a regular gratitude practice helps with happiness and creativity also.
What are you grateful for and what type of gratitude practice fits into your day?
Many of the practices above are variations of mindfulness activities. Mindfulness is also another popular term these days and can mean different things to various folks and traditions. For the purpose of creativity though the type that fuels creativity is open monitoring - a science-y way of saying - let your thoughts go where they want and practice non-attachment to them and non-judgment. When we practice watching our thoughts we create more calm in our body and nervous systems because we aren’t identifying AS our thoughts.
What these practices can do is create space for incubation of ideas and connections. Incubation makes sense to me until I hear Adam Grant - an org psychologist - talk about procrastination as a tool to creativity’s incubation. Scrreeech to a halt. He said in a TedTalk, “Procrastinating is a vice when it comes to productivity, but it can be a virtue for creativity.” But then it makes sense given that brain subconsciously works on ‘problems’ while we move on to other activities - as you know - our brains are always going. So as we move on and do other things - maybe procrastinate - the brain makes connections. Now I can see how creating routine for these above practices allows for that incubation time and makes space for the new connections to come into our awareness. Kapow!
Me on my yoga mat in my backyard getting multiple practices of being outside, movement, and exercise.