[-photography, process-]

Originally uploaded by tejana.

This beautiful macro taken at a beach, by tejana, reminds me of the impermanence of … everything.

Sand is one of the most malleable of substances. It’s constantly altered by the tides, the wind, even the small beings living within it. Whether a large wave, a sprinkle of raindrops, or a human foot, each causes a rearrangement and a new design.

Our lives, our creative efforts are no different.

If I had finished my novel last December, for example, instead of waiting until now to do it, the words I chose would have been different. I’m subtly rearranged from the person I was when I put the writing aside. Therefore, what comes out of me now, will be altered from what it would have been then. This isn’t a bad thing, but it is something to acknowledge. It might be a (well-needed ) reason not to put things off if we can help it.

Each new day, we need to attempt to put our mark on something in order to capture what and who we are on that particular day - the way tejana so beautifully preserved the sand’s essence in this spot on this day.

Thank you, tejana ~~~

Here are some links to articles about paying attention to the marks we make:
- doodles by Maureen Shaughnessy
- marks have meaning, about self-promotion
- marks have meaning, an art tutorial
- mark my words, a graphic reminder

Procrastination articles:
- Suze Corte - Mind Space
- a PCQ-QCP - The Imaginary Deadline
- a Practically Mperfect article - Collecting Dust

The other side of NOT finishing things:
- Karen Hatzigeorgiou - You, Me and Leonardo da Vinci

Originally published in the original Practically Creative blog, February 2006

[-practically mperfect-]

by Nancy S.M. Waldman

You need chaos in your soul to give birth to a dancing star.

Friedrich Nietzsche said that and I - with quite a bit of creative chaos in my life - completely understand what he means. Chaos - if we tone it down to a buzz of unrestrained energetic activity - can be an inspirational muse. However, chaos is hardly the only thing we need for creativity.

Creative chaos will not get a zine out - on time or otherwise. “Quarterly” doesn’t mean much to the chaos swirling in one’s soul. Chaos doesn’t know a single thing about html or how to put in a link that works. And chaos can’t write an essay for anything in the world.

Chaos does not keep up the blog entries.

Chaos cannot re-write a novel.

For those things and more, you need another “c” word; a word with a lot less magic, a lot less pizzazz, a lot less playfulness. You need consistency. This, folks, is the practical side of being practically creative. And it - or the want of it - comes up frequently for me.

Like all creatively conscious people, I adore those brilliant flashes of creativity when disparate ideas and materials come together in a new and exciting way. This stimulates and energizes and feeds on itself. So, if I occasionally feel those brilliant flashes, why worry about something as dull as consistency? Because not only does consistency accomplish tasks that chaotic creativity can’t, it also feels good to accomplish daily goals. Chaos cannot accomplish long-term, complicated projects. It takes consistency. It takes showing up for work, day after day.

For about a month after the first issue of the year came out, I was “showing up” to the Practically Creative blog most days. It was fun and creatively stimulating for me and, I believe, for others. I had plenty of gloriously creative raw material thanks to the Practically Creative flickr group. It didn’t take much time and I always felt better after doing them. It’s similar to the way I feel physically after exercising. Often I resist, but I always feel better when I do it. With the blog-roll I was on in February and early March, there was no reason for me to think that I couldn’t continue doing consistent daily blog entries forever. No reason except self-knowledge and experience. By now, I know myself pretty well.

Chaos and consistency don’t easily coexist. In my life and I think, the lives of many artistically creative people, chaos more often than not bests consistency in hand-to-hand, day-to-day combat. Even if we just call it moodiness, it’s enough to get us off track. So what can we do about it? We need both ‘creative chaos’ and consistency and they are close to being mutually exclusive!

We have to do what it says at the top of this article. We have to learn to accept our shortcomings. Consistency isn’t a parlour trick like a white rabbit conjured out of a hat. If it’s not in us as a natural attribute, then we have to practice acceptance, but we also have to foster more functional habits. It is a balancing act - think tightrope walker’s skill rather than a magician’s trick - to accept who we are. To embrace the strong parts of ourselves, those parts that are capable of giving “birth to a dancing star” while also repeatedly disciplining ourselves to show up so we can finish and bring our creative projects to the world.

Getting down on ourselves because we fail only gets in our way. The goal is not perfection. It is progress. Guilt and self-hatred come from that perfectionist thinking and will keep us from showing up tomorrow if we let it. Only a balance of self-awareness and the steady goal of making ourselves better at consistency will help us achieve a finished product.

Writer, Stephen Nachmanovitch said this about creativity:

The noun of self becomes a verb. This flashpoint of creation in the present moment is where work and play merge.

We will, more often than not, miss that brilliant flashpoint if we haven’t shown up for the work. That’s consistency. We have to work when we aren’t inspired. We have to work even when we feel uncreative. We have to do it when it isn’t intuitive. The experience of it being “play” instead of “work” will follow from that consistent effort.

Whether or not we finish our creative projects - whether, for instance, my novels get re-written or my blog gets an entry today - isn’t going to make a difference in anyone else’s life, but it will in our own. Even if consistency isn’t our strongest trait let’s vow to continue working on the habit of showing up everyday.

Maybe today there will be a brilliant flash and, just maybe, that star will dance.

Originally published in the July 2006 issue of The Practically Creative Quarterly
© 2006 - 2007 all rights reserved

[-tip, practices-]

simple practices have profound impacts

Most of us tend to work better and - more importantly, finish! - if we have a deadline. If you don’t have a *real* one, try this as a mental trick.

Seek out a real world or an online individual or group. Set imaginary, but realistic, deadlines for yourselves and then urge each other to stick to them.

You’ll be surprise how much it helps even when the deadline has no consequences associated with it.

It’s also amazing how much it motivates to know that someone *out there* cares whether or not you keep going!

Don’t be discouraged if you have to try several groups or people before you find the right rapport. Discovering like-minded people is worth it, so keep looking if you haven’t found them yet.

If you belong to a group that helps in this way, post a comment to let others know.

For writers: NaNoWriMo - National Novel Writing Month
For artists: Illustration Friday

[-inspiration, process-]

by Suze Corte

Inspiration? I am often and easily inspired! What to do with that inspired feeling-how to put it to creative uses-is another matter entirely. As an artist, teacher and creative junkie, I dread the times when something seems to get stuck in my creative machinery, jamming up the works somewhere between inspired concept and output. I have reached the conclusion that I am in desperate need of a mechanic, the grease monkey in charge of tuning up the engine and making it go. I think of this oft-absent spirit as my Studio Muse.

Looking back, it’s obvious that the ability to recognize and experience moments of inspiration emanates from my childhood. My siblings and I were encouraged to be creative thinkers, flexible and open to many possible solutions to problems. Not only were we surrounded with readily available art materials and books, but we also had plenty of time for free play outdoors among the grasses and trees and toads. One of my favorite childhood haunts was a spot up in the branches of an oak tree. There I would follow the seasons of my imagination, communing with the ever-changing leaves enclosing my dreamy perch. Nowadays I realize that I received a priceless gift: carefree time in a beautiful natural setting to get to know myself well. I had the delicious opportunity to reflect, to dream, to imagine, to be engaged, to connect, to plan. As a result, I grew up to be an artist and teacher whose antennae are ever ready to detect tiny tantalizing tidbits of inspiration.

I was fortunate to grow up in a family that supported creative pursuits, honoring books and supplying materials for exploration and discovery. Through the years, my creative outlook has provided me with many successes. I have a healthy marriage to an amazing man. We have an intelligent, creative, beautiful daughter. My home is filled with handmade pillows, drawings, and poems. I have created businesses, taught art classes and preschool, written elegant research papers, and created hundreds of gifts for friends, family and clients. So what am I complaining about?

Well, I’m not complaining. I am sad and frustrated that when I sit down to work, I often feel that my Studio Muse has left the building! I’m wanting more. And because I’ve been wanting more ever since I can remember, I have decided to begin today by actively inviting my Studio Muse to move back in with me on a full-time basis. In the back of my mind is an idea of what my muse looks like, and my plan is to create an actual likeness of her. I know that she will take three-dimensional form, but that’s as specific as I can be right now. I want to manifest her in real form so that she can aid me in moving from my imagination-fantasy-dreaming world into my action-doing-productive mode. I will let you know in the ensuing months as this work-in-progress develops. In the meantime, look over my shoulder as I begin the process of defining, designing and refining the great Studio Muse Experiment!

DEFINING - Top Five Things My Studio Muse Will Be:

• 5. Powerful, wise, beautiful, quirky, encouraging, strong, brave, pushy.
• 4. Capable of evoking laughter and/or tears at just the right times.
• 3. Three-dimensional and multi-faceted.
• 2. Available for late-night consultations.
• 1. Fun.

DESIGNING - Top Five Things My Studio Muse Will Be Designed to Do:

• 5. Take up residence in my life.
• 4. Make her presence known when my attitude toward work is unproductive, resistant, or rebellious.
• 3. Request candle-lighting ceremonies.
• 2. Surround herself with inspiring trinkets.
• 1. Preside over my studio with panache.

REFINING - Top Ten Things My Studio Muse Will Help Me Do:

• 10. Show up regularly.

Practical steps: I will write on my calendar each week specific times when I am going to walk into my studio to work. I will also write down how much time I plan to set aside for each studio session. I’ll leave three reminders around the house, scrawled in crayon and possibly decorated with sequins, saying something like “Show Up! 5:30pm Tuesday!!~signed, Your Studio Muse.”

• 9. Stay for the whole “session.”

Practical steps: If I sit down at my studio table and begin to feel that I have nothing to do, nothing to contribute, nothing to say, so be it. I will still stay for the allotted time. I can push beautiful papers around, rearrange things on the shelves, organize paintbrushes, color-code files, rip fabric, cut funny words out of magazines, scribble on 14 different surfaces, make a list of why I should never come here again, decide how I’m going to destroy all the things I’ve started but never finished, or just sit and listen to music. But I’ll stay.

• 8. Enter with an open heart.

Practical steps: As I open the door and go in, I will look at my Studio Muse and be reminded that this is a place where I can expect to reveal my inner feelings, learn about myself, play, hurt when necessary, rejoice, grow, surprise myself, be surprised by the work.

• 7. Begin lightheartedly.


Practical steps: I will begin a ritual of entering my studio with a song, a dance, and a quirky idea to begin the work. I’ll follow through with the music and the fun idea, and then I’ll go on from there wherever the spirit takes me. I may end up crying by the end of the session, but that will be okay because feeling deeply is an integral part of any creative life.

• 6. Focus on work.

Practical steps: I am in my studio to work. Often creative people seem to work by playing, just as children learn best through play and through their senses. I will remain intentional about being at work/play and if I get off track, I’ll write down three things I’d like to work on. This may be just the trick to get me back to what I’m clearly wanting and needing to do.

• 5. Ignore distractions.

Practical steps: I will be present in the moment and worry about everything else later. I will not answer the phone, do laundry, or watch TV, nor will I be lured to my computer whilst in the studio zone.

• 4. Keep an inspirational journal.

Practical steps: I will create a journal that stays on my studio worktable. Since many items I’ll want to keep will be three-dimensional, i.e., lumpy, I’ll also have an adjunct “journal box” where I can keep a collection of stuff. The journal & box will be lovingly created so that I enjoy looking at them daily. I will deposit ideas, concepts, clippings, bits of nature, drawings, snippets of thoughts, song lyrics, bits of paper, lines from books and movies, quotes, things people have said to me, essays, photos, doodles, techniques I want to try, lists, fabric scraps, threads, cords and strands!

• 3. Be present in the moment.

Practical steps: Through easily accessible sensory clues-a scented candle, good music, nice lighting, comfortable seating, and an evocative Muse right before my eyes-I will attempt to place myself into a state that conjures up my productive, playful, emotional, inspired creative working self.

• 2. Remind me of who I am.

Practical steps: When I enter my workspace and see my personal Muse and Inspiration Journal, I will be visually reminded of who I am and what I want to do. I will know again that It Does Matter and will even remember–on a good day–why it matters!

• 1. Show my work in the world.

Practical steps: I will reveal my work to other people often and without a care as to what they might think. Since my Studio Muse is always there for me, to remind me who I am and to keep me centered, I will feel better about venturing out into the world with my babies-my creative offspring. My worth comes from within my own heart and soul, not from anything or anyone outside of me.

• And the Number One Thing I Hope
  The Studio Muse Experiment Does For You?

INSPIRE!

Originally published in the April 2005 issue of The Practically Creative Quarterly, theme: inspiration
© 2005 - 2007; all rights reserved

About the author:
Suze Corte is a writer, artist and pre-school teacher in Houston, Texas. In 2007, she was chosen as be the Houston Area Association of Educator’s of Young Children’s Teacher of the Year and the Texas Association of Educators of Young Children’s Teacher of the Year. Congratulations, Suze! It is a well-deserved recognition.


To see all of Suze’s PCQ articles and art, click on her name in the tags.

[-essay, practically mperfect-]

by guest contributor, Karen Hatzigeorgiou

Are you one of those types of people who always has several different projects going at the same time? I know I am. Right now I have five unfinished altered books and four collages in varying stages of completion. I’m in the middle of reading two different books and two different magazines. I have two different journals — one in a little moleskin book I keep in my purse and another composition notebook that I keep by my bed. I’ve been trying to clean up my office-slash-studio (a never ending battle similar to trying to keep up with the laundry,) but am also in the middle of painting and redecorating my youngest son’s bedroom. I’m sure I’ll get most of what I’ve started completed someday, but if I don’t– so what?

Now I’m not saying that it’s okay to not meet a deadline or to leave my son sleeping in the living room indefinitely. I’m just saying that simply because I didn’t finish that embroidery of a unicorn that’s still in my sewing box from fifteen years ago doesn’t mean that I’m a bad person. But it’s taken me a while to come to that realization. And one of the things that helped me realize that unfinished projects don’t equal failure was when I read the book How to Think Like Leonardo da Vinci by Michael J. Gelb.

This book is about being a creative thinker in the way that Leonardo da Vinci was. But what impressed me the most as I read about da Vinci’s life was discovering the number of projects that da Vinci never completed.

Consider the following: First of all, da Vinci’s journal shows elaborate plans to create the bronze statue of his idea of a perfect horse– a statue that was never made. He also did a series of sketches for a commissioned painting that he never painted. In addition, because da Vinci couldn’t bring himself to paint the face of Jesus Christ, he was never able to finish painting his great masterpiece The Last Supper. And amazingly, of the seventeen paintings of da Vinci’s still in existence, a number of them are also incomplete.

Yet despite all this unfinished work, we still consider Leonardo da Vinci to be a man of genius. He was the original “Renaissance Man,” a person whose incredible imagination and creativity spanned a broad range of disciplines such as engineering, architecture, art, and science, to name just a few.

As it turns out, I have a lot in common with Mr. da Vinci, and I’m sure that you do as well. Consider the incredible imagination and creativity we need to handle the broad range of disciplines such as child rearing, culinary arts, domestic engineering, personal management, and psychology (just to name a few) that many of us are expected to be proficient in. Not to mention the artistic talents we seek to nurture.

I find it reassuring to see the similarities between this great man’s life and my own and to know that he left many unfinished projects scattered across France and Italy. No one considers da Vinci’s life to have been a “failure.” No one consider his unfinished works to be “failures” because they were left undone. They were all valuable attempts to create a meaningful life. And they certainly didn’t stop da Vinci from his quest to find truth and beauty in the world around him, much as you and I do everyday.

So it’s time that we stop berating ourselves for starting Project B before we’ve finished Project A, or for feeling guilty for buying supplies for both tole painting and card making. And when we’re torn between cutting and pasting one more image down on that collage or putting in another load into the washing machine, we need to remember Leonardo da Vinci. Let’s look in the mirror, honor all our efforts to find truth and beauty in the world, and reward ourselves with our very own Mona Lisa smile.

© 2005-2007 - Karen Hatzigeorgiou - all rights reserved

See Karen’s tutorial in The PCQ about her beautiful Altered Books.

About the Author: Karen Hatzigeorgiou is a wife, mother, seventh grade English teacher, and an artist and writer. This is a revision of an earlier article. You can see her art work, find tips and techniques for creating your own art, and read more of her musings at her web site at karenswhimsy.com.
You can email her at karen@karenswhimsy.com. Thanks, Karen!

Originally published in the July 2005 issue of The Practically Creative Quarterly, theme: Space and Spaces

[-practically mperfect, collecting-]

by Nancy S.M. Waldman

You might think this essay will be about how to keep one’s collections free of dust. It’s not. While I could easily and truthfully admit to hating to dust my various collections (and everything else), what I have to confess goes much deeper.

I’m the one who’s been gathering dust.

Apathy overtook me in August. Spring into summer were energetic and fun. I had the joy of experiencing the birth of my new granddaughter, took three trips, entertained house guests, started knitting a sweater, discovered the world of Artist Trading Cards, took loads of photos and made plans to spend August revising my last novel before I threw myself into the joyful job of putting this issue together.

What happened instead is that I became immobilized. Not only couldn’t I seem to get moving on that revision no matter what tricks I tried - and I know a lot of them - but I couldn’t get moving period. The more I forced myself to look at the first draft of my novel the worse I felt, not only about the writing but moreso about myself. Finally I let myself off the writing hook for the time being. However, I still seemed encrusted in apathy.

All my gorgeous and inviting art supplies were out, awaiting my next batch of Artist Trading Cards. I wasn’t interested. I wasn’t even interested in looking through other people’s cards on the internet to find ones to trade for what I’ve already made. I couldn’t work up the energy to garden. I couldn’t find the motivation to work on my sweater. Worst of all, I had no interest in THIS, my zingy zine! Since last January gathering articles, essays, images, poetry and fun web sites has been one of the joys of my life. When I wasn’t doing something else, I loved dipping into the internet to see what I could discover. But in August, all that joyful energy was gone. I had the creative energy of a porcelain bunny. A bunny gathering dust. A dust bunny.

I don’t tell you this because I think I’m unusual or weird or special or even interesting. I feel the need to write about it precisely because this phenomenon is so common among creative people. We zip along a cable wire high above the rest of the world and then - boom! - hit the end of our exhilarating run with a thwarting thud; we hit it so hard that we can’t get up, or move, or motivate. We lie where we landed, gathering dust.

And then…we begin to hate ourselves. We tell ourselves all kinds of horrible things. That we aren’t talented. That we were stupid to feel so good about our creations. That we never were an artist to begin with because we can never stick to something long enough. The negativities can go on and on, our minds filling with creativity sapping thoughts.

The problem isn’t the down time. The problem is that we kick ourselves when we’re down.

The best most of us can hope for is to learn enough to short cut the recovery time. Wait it out. Do new things. Rest. Veg. But above all, do not get down on yourself. Be kind. Be respectful, not only of yourself but also of your work. Gradually we will come out of it. I recommend an end of the month publishing deadline! It worked for me. Then you can dust yourself off and get moving, full of the knowledge that for most of us, part of being creative is needing to periodically take the time to sit still, gather a layer of dust and wait for the right time to begin again.

Originally published in the October, 2005 issue of The Practically Creative Quarterly, Theme: Collections