Empowered Creativity
A look at what's making us more creative
71% of you said you had more creativity during lockdown.
So what’s making us feel more creative and why? Here I use my experience as a senior creative designer as well as psychology work within coaching to reveal ways to empower creativity.
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At the beginning of February I had a week, amidst home-schooling to focus 3-4 hours a day on my work. Excited to research and give clarity to creativity I decided to focus and document this week. This post investigates the creative journey so more of us can approach creativity with ease and action. I began with this...
A poll on Instagram stories showed 71% of you had more creativity during lockdown. So for the 29% and to access more of our creative potential I asked:
1. What’s making you feel more creative?
Life is too short 35% Creativity is my escape 65%
Escapism has been challenged this year with our usual go tos not being accessible or simply being not as fun as they were. There is negative escapism that involves things that don't give us energy but numb and sometimes drain us. These can highly influence our levels of tiredness. Examples are phone scrolling, some TV programs etc.
Positive escapism creates a sense of ease because what we are doing nurtures our energy and fills our cups. Examples can be where you find inspiration, an enriching conversation, making something etc. Creativity is known to create positive affects on our wellbeing. The poll implies it’s being used as a method to fill you with energy.
Quickly lets look as ‘life is too short’ – in many conversations I’ve had ‘what we want to create’ is often a wish but not prioritised. With more time at home, to reflect on self and our lives, more people are looking for change towards a happier lifestyle, be it in career, location etc. We know if we want change we need to know what else is possible, we begin to imagine. This could well be the reason we are jumping into a practise that promotes wellbeing and imagination.. creativity.
2. What makes your feel more creative?
Less pressure – 83% Have more energy – 17%
Pressure is one of the biggest un-serving hurdles that gets in our way.
For me it looks like leaving creativity till the evening.
This could look like when I worked at McQ Alexander McQueen. The peacefulness of the office in the evening aided concentration, or so I thought. A more sustainable approach and one I was speaking to a coaching client about recently was the need for boundaries on time in the day to allow her to concentrate.
Or perhaps being productive in the evenings was because we can lower our expectation of productivity in the evening when compared with other evening pursuits. Covincidently it can be linked to evidence of feeling more creative when we are relaxed and entering our alpha state. As we relax our mind naturally imagines more as we near our subconscious and dreamlike state.
Creativity can be our way back to our full selves, present + in joy.
In curiosity we find the beauty of where we want to go.
If you'd like to delve into your mindset behind creativity schedule a call with me here. I work with clients to empower their creativity, often who seek a change, more strength or a way to do things differently.
Photography of my work and inspiration images.
Stats from Instagram Stories poll asked Feb 2020