Brainstorm/Braincalm

Whenever I get into the state of creative overwhelm, I think, “I have so many ideas and they’re all pretty good and I don’t know which to pick ahhh!!!!!!”

So then I do NONE of the ideas. 🙂

I’m doing my best to work within creative overwhelm, and I think the antidote to it could be organization.

But then I think, “I like organizing. What if I spend too much time organizing and don’t ever get to doing the actual work? Ahhhh!!!!”

(My inner dialogue is very dramatic.)

It seems that finding a balance between brainstorm and brain-restraint is key.

Today I spent an hour planning the week ahead, including which blog posts and Instagram posts I’ll put up this week. This gives me leisurely weekend time to work on illustrations, as well as an unexpected bounty of peace of mind.

Maybe somewhere in the middle of brainstorm (artistic blustering) and brain-restraint (organized scheduling) is a nice happy state. Braincalm. Ahhh. It kind of sounds like a brand of medicated lotion, but I’ll roll with it for now.

We’ll see if it works!

(I use the “Ubiquitous Capture Device” aka, the really tricked-out notebook above for organizing my work. I got it at 11:11 Supply, a great store built around goal-setting here in Portland.)

Harvesting Flowers

Dahlias are a wonderful and magical plant: if you want the plant to produce more flowers, you harvest the flowers. For every bloom you cut, two more pop up in its place.

Creative ideas work the same way. When we have ideas for projects, artworks, essays, novels, we’re often tempted to hold on to them, to save them for the perfect time. When we do this sort of “idea hoarding,” it puts a stopper on our creative flow.

However, when we pluck that idea from within our head and make it into something real, when we create our art and put it out into the world, no matter how imperfect or unfinished it is, the creative flow continues.

Ideas beget ideas, cut flowers beget more flowers to cut.

Happy harvest season!

 

 

Ego Voice/God Voice

When I make visual art, I get quiet enough to hear the voices in my head.

I hear the voice that says, “This is stupid, no one will like this,” or the voice that says, “This is pretty! People will love this!”

When I’m making art, I sometimes get impatient. I ask myself, “Why am I doing this? When will I ‘GET THERE!?!?'” (<— “There” being the place of making the brilliant art that will illicit worldwide adoration and spark the insights that will raise our collective consciousness and ultimately bring about world peace. It’s a modest aim, really.)

So, when making art, I get impatient. But, often at the point of impatience, I hear a deeper, wiser voice. A voice that surprises me.

When I ask, “Why am I doing this?” this voice says, “That doesn’t matter. Keep going.”

“Keep going” is the mantra that comes from somewhere inside of me, a place I have no conscious control over.

How do I know when I’m hearing the “keep going” voice, or as I call it, the “God” voice? (Not necessarily as in the ultimate voice of the almighty, perhaps just the voice of God within me, my highest self.) How do I distinguish that voice from that voice that is trying to protect myself from ridicule, the fear, or “Ego” voice?

I keep practicing, keep listening, and notice patterns:

The “Ego” voice talks in value judgements: “This is stupid, this looks bad, why are you doing this?” or “This is great! Everyone will recognize your genius!” Noted. (Welllll, kind of noted. Truth be told, I’m susceptible to self-inflation and somewhat prone to bragging, so it takes me a little longer to realize the “I’m great!” voice is also the ego voice. Oh well. “Keep going,” right?)

The Ego voice also talks in “shoulds.” As in, “Maybe you should learn to use markers better before you share your marker drawings,” or “You should probably get a real job for a while and put this creativity stuff on the back burner until the kids are in school.”

Hm.

In contrast, the “God” voice often talks in “want.”

For example, one internal conversation that happened when I was painting went like this:

“I should probably take a painting class. I could spend a year getting better at painting and then actually make good art.” (<— Voice #1)

“I don’t want to take a painting class, it’s not time to ‘get better’ at anything. That feels like a lateral move.” (<— Voice #2)

Voice #1 (Ego voice) felt very familiar. The procrastinator voice, the voice of reason. What Voice #2 (God voice) said surprised me. Wasn’t I supposed to want to get better at stuff? Isn’t it kind of cocky to think that I was already “good enough” to make and share my art?

But I knew in my heart that Voice #2, God voice, was true. I didn’t want to take a class, that sounded tedious and uninspiring. I realized that I was at a point where I had learned as much technique as I needed. It was time to explore what I already knew, and to discover things that I didn’t know I knew. It was time to express myself with the tools and abilities I already had.

As I made art and practiced listening to and distinguishing my internal voices, I began to believe that this “God” voice was true. But it wasn’t an intellectual knowing– as I said, I knew it in my heart.

The God voice is often accompanied by a bodily feeling.

When my Ego voice is talking, it triggers a knitting of my brow, rolling eyes, a twisted mouth. The “thinking,” or “trying to figure out” face. A busy mind, disconnected from the body below.

When the God voice talks, it feels like an open heart, a face washed of tension in the presence of a deeper revelation. Kind of a light, surprised, “Huh!”

And, almost always, the emotion that the God voice inspires is relief. As in, “Ahhhh, I don’t have to make this so hard and complicated. I just get to keep going, keep discovering, keep listening, keep practicing, keep playing.”

Keep doing what I love doing,

keep making what I love making,

keep being who I love being.