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I love a grand gesture, a giant cake, a huge display of lights at Christmas.  I do!  I love big, shiny things.  But you know what I love even more?  Tiny, sparkly little treasures.  They gleam and glisten and entice you to draw closer, focus in, get still and attentive.  They're mesmerizing and full of wonder.

Small Things 1

So what does this have to do with creativity coaching or a creative life?  So much!  Small things are beautiful and powerful and full of everything we love.  And Small Steps will get us to those dreams we love.

In Kaizen-Muse Creativity Coaching™ we're all about small things--Small Steps, Small Questions.  We love them!  Why?  Because they do so much while being so easy to wrap your brain around.  This also has to do with a creative life because being a creative doesn't happen in a vacuum.  We live in a busy world.  We have a lot going on.  Things that fuel our creative dreams and fit into the rest of our lives are priceless!  Small Steps are the way to get there without letting everything else fall away.

Convinced?  It's okay if you're not sure.  We've been taught to believe that we need to do big things, make huge changes, do something dramatic to change our lives.  (Have you seen some of the things people do when they want to ask someone to marry them?!)  So Small Steps may seem weird at first.  That's okay.  Try them out anyhow and see what you can do.  Here's how:

First things first.  Pick your dream.  What's something you'd like to get started or make progress on?  What creative dream would you like to come true?  Write that down.  Put the note someplace you'll see it often.  There.  That's a Small Step and  it's a reminder of what you want to do.

Next, ask yourself a few questions.  Write down the answers if you like (it's okay if you don't have answers right away or only have a few), but most importantly ask the questions.

Questions to ask yourself:

  • What could I do in just five minutes? Two minutes?
  • What would feel good to do right now?
  • What is the smallest thing I can do that is connected to my creative dream?

Now, pick one of those small steps and do it.  Do it again tomorrow, or the next time you have five minutes (or two).  Try this out for a week, maybe two.  Then look back and see what you've done, one Small Step at a time.  Give yourself a pat on the back!  Then make a new list of things you can do and do one.  And now you're on your way to your creative dream!


There's still time to sign up for the MuseCraft™ Explorers' Club (starts July 9).  We'll talk small steps, we'll walk them together.  We'll have fun and make our way toward those creative dreams together.  Join me?

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10

This is a reprint, with slight alterations, of a newsletter article I did a few years ago.  I'm reposting it after several recent conversations with people telling me that they don't like to-do lists and schedules and things because they feel restricted, boxed in, constrained.  But there's also a lot of talk about not getting much of anything done, and I really think the two things--resistance to structure and lack of progress--are connected.

I've noticed something about we creative types. We like to feel free and wild, flying around the
aether with our creativity spreading behind us like wings. Structure? Bah! We don't want structure!
We're free. You can't put us in a box!Jellyfish

The thing is, without structure we often lack focus and direction. We float along, shapeless, like
jellyfish pushed and pulled by the tides. I don't know about you, but I don't want to be a jellyfish.

Here's an important secret—structure is not our enemy. It's more like the skeleton we hang our
creativity on, the underlying form that helps us determine what direction our work will go in. At an
immediate, project by project level, structure is deciding that you'll work on a painting today instead of
a novel or work on photo editing instead of an art quilt. It helps us get things done by keeping us from
trying to do everything all at once.

There are also greater structures in our lives that help us feed and nurture our creativity, things that
make it easier to create when we want to. Some of these are the same things that help us get to work on
time, get ready for bed, buy groceries for the week. Our daily, weekly, monthly routines can become a
structure to help us shape our creative time and space.

Structure adds form and substance and beauty to our creativity.
Structure adds form and substance and beauty to our creativity.

I know the word “routine” sometimes has a bad reputation. We frequently use it as a synonym for
“dull” or “boring.” But having routines keeps us from having to reinvent the wheel over and over to do
the things we need to do. If you create and choose your routines with intention and thoughtfulness,
with an eye to making time and space for your creativity, your routines can become the structure that
lets your creativity thrive.

So how do you build a structure for your creativity? The same way construction workers build a house
—one beam at a time. This is especially important if you are a multi-creative. Don't try to force long
stretches of time to work on all of your creative pursuits every week. Start out either by choosing a
favorite creative pastime and working that into your life regularly or by finding a particular time each
week (for me, it's Thursday evenings) and dedicate that time to doing whatever creative thing pulls you
when the time comes.

Work this new piece into your existing structure—you're building an addition, not creating an entirely
new dwelling. Look at your routines and your schedule, decide what is and isn't working and tweak
things to make them work better, then find the places where adding in creative time will work best. I'll
go back to the Thursday evenings I mentioned as an example. For me, my regular schedule leaves me
with the whole house to myself on Thursdays after work, so this is a natural time to work on creative
projects.

Once your new addition has become a comfortable, regular part of your life, look around for the next
place you can add on to your routine. Eventually, as with building anything, if you work steadily and
thoughtfully, you will have a life structure that will leave you the time and space you need for your
creativity. You'll be able to do the things you want, and your Muse will thank you for it every day.


OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA
There's still time to join in on the adventure in the
MuseCraft™ Explorers' Club!  Sign up today
and start down the path to your creative dreams.

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18

Okay, it's not really on my table, but it's what I was working on this past week (and some paintings, of course), so I thought I'd stick with the normal Monday routine a little and use my usual title.

Detail Collage
Details from a few of my favorite painted pages--in squares, of course, because I'm loving squares right now.

So, about that blog tour...I was invited to join in on the tour by Theresa of Indigene Art Forms.  This blog tour has been going on for a while, and everyone who participates gets to invite others, so there are lots of links to follow back through the tour.  Give yourself a little gift and follow the link path--there's lots of great stuff to discover!

For the tour, I'm answering four questions about myself:

What am I working on?

Right now possibly the biggest thing is my 100 Paintings Project.  I have always considered myself a writer who dabbles in art, but I am wanting to claim that title of "artist" for myself, and I'm starting with a big pile of paintings!

I'm also working on a really fun coaching circle (MuseCraft™ Explorers' Circle) that will be starting in July--I'm really excited about this--it's going to be a creative adventure!  What could be better than that?  Info and sign-ups are almost ready to fly out into the world--I'll keep you posted.

What else am I working on? (Because I'm always doing bunches of things, it's just in my nature.)  Working on a new blog posting schedule and a couple of cool ideas for blog challenges for late summer and fall.  Working on some downloadables that I think are going to be great fun.  And working on, or at least thinking about, restarting my newsletter.

Things are going to be really exciting around here starting in the next couple of weeks, and I am thrilled that some of my ideas are going to get out into the world to share with everyone!

How does my work differ from others of its genre?

I'm still in the fairly early stages of my visual art work, but I think that some of my creativity coaching experience and my writing experience are making their way into my art and helping to put my own personal stamp on it.  In coaching I work with making small changes a lot, and I find that I approach my paintings that way, adding a few dots here or lines there and then letting it be until the next idea comes.  And from my writing I seem to have brought the idea of leaving some things to the viewer's imagination--I'm finding that I really like a small amount of detail and a lot of hints of things.  I may branch out and do things like more shaded and detailed faces, etc., but right now I'm really enjoying what I'm doing.

Why do I write/create what I do?

My writing and painting tends to be about mysterious things--fairies and magic and secret things that are hard to see.  I like to explore the ideas of hidden realms and magic in our own world in my writing, and this is starting to emerge in my painting as well.  I don't have an explanation for why I love these things, though.  I always have (my mother will tell you that by the age of two I had to watch every monster movie that came on, and I never missed a showing of Alice in Wonderland or The Wizard of Oz.)

I think we are born with a pull toward certain things.  We often learn to cover it up, ignore it, pretend it isn't there, but our hearts have things they gravitate toward, and mine loves all things strange and weird and inexplicable.  And I think it's very important to listen to what pulls your heart, and if you can't hear it or feel it any more, I think it's incredibly important to excavate for it.  As Rumi said, “Let yourself be silently drawn by the strange pull of what you really love. It will not lead you astray.”

How does your writing/creating process work?

It works best in small bursts.  I am rarely the sort who sits down to work and stays there for six hours.  I lay down a layer of paint then wander off to do other things while it dries, then I come back and do the next bit--sometimes that means painting for ten minutes, other times I might be there an hour depending on what I'm doing.  But bits and pieces and spurts work best for me.  For writing, too--I write best when I set a time for ten or fifteen minutes and then sit back for a minute or two (or five if I need more coffee or tea), and then do it again.  I guess I'm a sprinter rather than a marathoner.

So there's a little bit about me.  Now the super-exciting part of the tour!  I get to introduce you to some great fellow creatives who agreed to join in on this journey.  Go visit their blogs and see what they're up to, and make sure to check in next Monday (June 9) for their blog tour posts.

Adriane Giberson

Adriane is a creative human living in BC, who has on occasion been called a Renaissance Woman. Ever delving into the mysteries of the life of art and the art of living & sharing the journey via the interwebz.

You can find Adriane online at http://adriane745.wix.com/theartsyfartsychick

Paula Kumert

Paula is a memory keeper, making time and space for her creativity in Buenos Aires, Argentina.

You can find Paula online at http://keepitsimplemakeitgreat.blogspot.com/

Barbara Martin

Barbara is a writer, artist, and all-around creative making lots art and hosting meetings and workshops for fellow creatives in Oregon.

You can find Barbara online at http://www.barbaramartinart.com/

 

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