Summer - Time to Refill the Creative Well
Wednesday, July 2nd, 2008Summertime, like Sundays, used to be a time of rest and relaxation. Of renewal and restoration. Of recharging batteries drained by the demands of the year.
Not anymore. We don’t know what it means to relax anymore. We have to take classes on relaxation so we can learn how to stop our endless, and sometimes meaningless, motion. So we can learn how to breath deeply from our bellies instead of only the upper third of our lungs. So we can learn how to unclench our muscles and our stomachs and our jaws.
Our advanced technologies bring us so many advantages, but they also sabotage every effort to unwind, to get away, to get quiet. They sabotage us because we let them. We feel compelled to stay tuned in, turned on and accessible—afraid we will miss something important, earth-shattering, life-changing.
It is that accessibility that is life-changing, however. When we fail to give ourselves time away or alone without distraction or interruption, without any intent or purpose other than to have none, we fail to nurture our souls. And we definitely fail to nurture our creativity.
One of the hardest things for artists, writers, and other creatives is the ability to get away from our creativity. So many of us work in studios in our homes where our work constantly calls to us. Others have such limited time for creativity because of demands of work and family that each free moment becomes a challenge to fill it with our creative work.
Yet empty moments and time out of the studio are necessary to refill the well of our creativity. It is in the silence and stillness that our spiritual and creative batteries are recharged, that our creative well is refilled.
Summer is a good time to slowly sip the sweet refreshment of silence and stillness. To sit on your patio to watch the birds dip and weave their ways through tree and bush. To float on your back in the water and watch clouds drift by. To stare up at the moon while she bathes you in light.
Be still. Be silent. Your body, mind and spirit will thank you. And so will your creative muse.
How will you give your creativity a summer moment?