Good evening. Oh, I got an itch. I wanted to talk tonight about tips to help spark creativity. I’ve been thinking a lot about creativity recently, partly because I actually wasn’t feeling very creative and I needed to be creative. So I went on a bit of a wandering meander about, what are the things that help me get more creative? What makes me feel more creative? What do I need to do? How do I need to think? All that kind of stuff. So as you know, with these Lives, if I learned something, I share it, pass it on. Is it, “Tag, you’re it?” “Tip, you’re it?” Yeah. Pass it on. Passing on a fount of knowledge. There we go. So the first thing I have to say about creativity rather, is you have to believe that you are creative. That’s the first stumbling block to being creative is believing that you actually are.
And the reality is, everyone is. We’re all creative, but it’s one of those things, like so many things that we explore and are just a part of our every day when we’re children, as we get older and we tend to think more about things rather than just doing things, we squished that creativity out of us, which is awful. So we need to reopen up that side of us to embrace our creative juices, so to speak. So it’s a tough one because I for years kept saying, “I’m not very creative.” “Oh yeah, I’m not very creative.”Because I associated creativity with being able to do things as an artist, so to be able to paint, or draw, or to write music. They were the things to me that meant you were creative, which is wrong. There is creative thinking in everything.
Believe it or not, the person that came up with this calculator had to be creative. It’s everything. It’s not just the pretty things. There’s creativity in everything. There’s creativity in this light, this computer, this dress, the lipstick. It’s everywhere. So I thought about it. I had to do some work on it for myself and I was like, “Oh, actually I can cook really interesting things. I can make great cakes. I love to play with makeup. I love to play with decorations around the house,” et cetera. So I was like, “Oh.” I accepted that I was creative in that artistic way, which then led me to go, “Oh, I also think creatively when I’m problem-solving or in business situations or onstage. I can think creatively to get out of a bit of a jam.” There’s so many areas you can be creative in. You can be creative in everything from what you wear, to what you like in the bedroom, to how you do your makeup, to how you talk to people, to how you walk down the street. You can put a little creative bounce in your step, which is always fun to do.
So okay, the second thing you got to really do, if you want to be creative, the more creative you want to be is you got to be okay with failure. Yeah. Sorry, because for every 101 creative ideas, they’re not all going to be winners. So you have to be okay with failure. And I’ve got a couple of Lives on failure. So feel free to go back and have a look at those. But yeah. Fail, learn, move on. So here are my top 10 tips. Are you ready? I’ve got to look at my list so I don’t forget any. So I’ll just move my phone over a little bit that way so I can do that thing. Oh, shivers. Now I did the wrong way. Okay. So number one, tip for sparking creativity is set aside … Sounds counter-intuitive, I know. Set aside time to do nothing. Coming from the scheduling queen herself.
You have to have space. You have to have space to be creative. And if that literally means you put an hour a week or half an hour a day, or whatever you want in your calendar for nothing, then that’s what you have to do. Because those creative juices, the more nothingness there is, the more they come to the forefront, which is just fantastic. This is the beautiful thing, the more creative you are, the more neural pathways open up and the more connections that happen within your brain, which means you can then be more creative, so more possibilities. So creativity leads to creativity, which is awesome.
Number two, get outside in nature. Yes. So for me, that’s water is inspiring. For other people might be hike in the mountains, a beach, a bike ride in a bush track. It could be just sitting in the garden, could be pruning your roses, but get outside in nature. It does wonders for creativity.
Number three, time to play. Now again, in our over-scheduled world, this is a tough one. But as I touched on last night with collecting experiences, rather not baggage, time to play is a big one. And again, that really helps open up more in pathways and connections, which means you’re more creative. So you want to look at things like music, dancing, cooking, games, because all of those things also, when you’re playing a game, you’re using different parts of your brain to just sitting down and doing something. So it energizes you and opens up a world of possibility. I’m going to say that probably 10 times. That world of possibility that is creativity. Now I’m just thinking of that song from Willy Wonka in a world of pure imagination. Journaling. Yes. A big one for creativity, especially things like morning pages.
I’ve mentioned her before, but Julia … Oh, I just had a mental blank. Julia Shiva’s book called “The Artist’s Way.” And she also has this brilliant thing on the artist web blog that has 101 ideas for artists dates, which are things to go out and do something to spark your creativity. So create a self-portrait. Sit on [inaudible 00:06:31], sit on a porch swing, lean your head back as far as you can and look up to the tree branches backwards. Cool. But have a look at that if you want to go more down that path. But yeah, definitely writing, journaling spikes creativity.
Number five, have an idea book. So I actually do this. I don’t have a book for this. I have a Pinterest thing and I have notes in my Dropbox and things like that. When I have an idea, it goes in an ideas file of things. Some of them may never see the light of day ever. Okay. If I’m funny, a friend on Facebook the other day posted a screenshot of book ideas he’d had and hadn’t done anything with, and one of them was a book on failure. He was like, “Funny that I failed to write the book on failure that I had the idea about. Just if you’ve got an idea, make sure you note it because otherwise you’ll forget. Our brains are not meant for storing stuff. Our brains are like computer processes. We need to get that stuff out. So if you had an idea, get it out. It’s got to get out, okay?
Number six, reignite a creative passion. You might have liked the tango when you were younger. Well, you might’ve liked painting with watercolors, or you may have loved your textiles and design class. That was not me. But if there was something in your childhood that you loved creativity, reignite it. Even if it wasn’t your early 20s that you did it, whatever it is. If you wanted to be a song writer and you liked doing that, start doing it again. Again, it doesn’t matter if any of this stuff doesn’t see the light of day. It’s about opening up your mind to then think creatively in work situations or in personal situations, rather than being stuck by these limiting ideas of answers for things, which I’m going to touch on it now in a second.
Number seven, get off devices and computers and screens and computers and all those things. They mess with your brain. Ironic me being on my phone, looking at a computer screen while I say that. But the more we’re offered devices, the more creativity we’ll feel, absolutely without a shadow of a doubt.
Okay. Number eight, think like a child. Yes. Not in that tantrum kind of way, but kids just get in there and do. They see sand, so they built a castle. Kids might see an empty cup or box and they can create a hat out of it. Kids think it’s a cold night, “Let’s build a fort under the dining room table with lots of blankets and watch TV.” Just go for it. When you’re thinking of something it’s just like, “Hmm, what would a six-year-old do in this situation?” They can have some of the best ideas. Oh my gosh.
Number nine, this is in particular to if you’re trying to think creatively about something and you’re a bit stuck. Okay. So I want you to have a Q and A session with yourself, with your team or your family. But I’ve written this from a personal point of view, but it can absolutely be done in a team environment, is have a brainstorm Q and A and where no idea is off the table. No idea is too stupid. No idea is too expensive. No idea has been done before. So ask open-ended questions and come up with as many possibilities for a solution to a problem, as many as possible. Come up with 100 if you can. I’ll try and do 52 because you know I like 52 because it’s 52 weeks in the year.
So I was writing, doing some content the other day and I couldn’t quite get what I needed out, so I asked myself a couple of questions and I just came up with, write the answers, write the answers, write the answers, write the answers. By the time I’ve done all that writing I was like, “Oh, okay. A whole lot of them are shit, but there’s a couple of great nuggets in there.” But it’s just that open ended, go for it, go for it that sparks that creativity. So that’s a big one.
Number 10. Now I did a Facebook Live on this particular thing a few weeks ago, a couple of months ago. I can’t remember. It was about having a muse. And I talked about how fashion designers, and artists, and singers, and musicians, and writers quite often have a muse and it’s someone they draw inspiration from. And I talked about the idea of having, if you don’t have a real one, like a real live muse, having a virtual one. And I really think it’s a good idea, especially to help you spark creativity. So you can go back and look at that one. But yeah, find yourself a muse, whether they be virtual or in real life.
Then I just wanted to add a couple of other things that are not my tips for spiking creativity, but they are things I do believe that really help with your creativity. Okay. So one of them is environment. If your person is inspired by color and your house is all beige, you’re probably not going to be feeling very creative. Likewise, if you like total minimalism and you have a bookshelf that looks like mine with lots and lots of books and lots and lots of books, lots of books, that would probably do your head in and not be helpful with creativity. So make sure you create an environment where you feel creative, where you can be free and creative, really important.
Another one is vision boards. Whether they’re digital or physical, vision boards are really important. Last year I used to do a vision diary, cover my diary. These days I’ve actually got an electronic one. I got a few things stuck up by the walls, but electronic for me at the moment. I just play with that. But they’re a great thing to help spark that creative juice. Now the one I’ve never actually done this, but a lot of people have told me it’s really helpful for being more creative and that’s to record your dreams. Now on the odd chance, I actually remember a dream, which I don’t very often, they’re usually so weird I think I need psychotherapy really quickly, so I don’t recall them. But apparently it’s really good for creativity. So maybe I’ll try that one.
Again. Meditation. Sorry. Yes, really good. Because it’s letting go of a whole lot of stuff in your head, which helps you get creative because we want that space, we want that freedom to be creative. Likewise, with vision boards and meditation, another exercise you can do is visualizations, which will help spark creativity because your letting your imagination go. Your opening up possibility again, to just go for things. So visualization, any visioning exercise, whether it’s from meditation process or a separate process, is brilliant for that kind of thing, for helping that. So these kind of things should be part of your daily life anyway, really great environment, vision boards, meditation, visualization.
And the last one, which I’m trying to incorporate a little bit more into my life and been reading a book on how to do it, is mind maps. Now I’m not finding it very easy, but I left it here because so many people I know mind maps are so powerful and they can literally … I’ve been at conferences and people listening to the speakers are mind mapping out what the speaker says and I’m blown away by how they do it. And those people generally incorporate mind maps into just about every aspect of their life. So I wanted to have it here as well, because for you, that might be one of the keys. Doing one mind map you might be a tool you need to do every day to help you be more creative, okay? So there you have my top 10 tips for spark and creativity. Don’t forget the most important bit though is you must, must believe that you are creative. We all are and of that, I promise you. Muah. Night-night. See you tomorrow.