How To Improve Creativity

If you want to know how to improve creativity in your work, you'll be glad to know there are literally an infinity of ways you can do it.

I think it's better to consider the process as allowing creativity to do its work, rather that finding a way to improve creativity.

Creativity is not something you can improve, it simply is.

Creativity is otherworldly almost, and when we get the feck out of our own way we allow it to express itself here.

Not allowing it do its work, standing in its way is where the whole idea of writer's block comes from.

Writer's block is resistance, and there's nobody else responsible for creating that than ourselves. It comes from a pushing to make things happen.

Artist expression in any area of life and work cannot function to its full capacity when we are forcing things to our will.

So we've got to find a way to tune out, to relax, to stop working and bring our mind to some task that is easy.

You can read, check out a movie, do some gardening, go for a walk of whatever your bag is.

I find that physical exercise is one of the key ways to do that.

Back Training After 2 Years

I've done more physical training in the last week than I've done in the last 2 years.

That's a big deal because I've always trained either for football, CrossFit, running or otherwise and I've always been in good shape.

But right now I'm not.

I had done a lot of marathons in 2015 for charity and after that, I just stopped all fitness altogether.

But I've hit a stage where I need to get my act together.

So now, not only from a writing perspective, given that I'm writing this book, but also from a diet and exercise and a career perspective things are changing.

Wondering how to improve creativity is not something I spend too much time on, to be honest. I just know that certain things help me move in the right direction.

Keeping fit is one of those.

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Exercise: Part Of The Creative Process

Right now I'm 88kg, that's 6kg overweight for me. I have about 1.5″ of belly fat on my abs where it never before was. I look in the mirror and I don't see me.

That's enough motivation for me to do something about it.

My fighting weight is 82kg and body fat hovers around 15% when I'm fit. So that's what I'm after.

I started last Sunday morning with a short run, and for the rest of the week I ran and did some lifting in the shed at the bottom of my garden.

There's no significant change yet but the process has started nonetheless.

Kind of like writing.

Kind of like everything really.

If I am to see results in my body and health then I've got to be prepared to put in the ‘hard work' as we've come to call it.

I've got to be dedicated, committed and consistent in my training if I am to see the results that I want.

This is the creative process and the creative process exists in everything. My fitness, my writing, the tomatoes growing on my window sill.

They are all subject to the same apparent process of creation.

How You Can Improve Your Creativity

There are a few key principles that I have discovered are required for creativity to spark and ignite.

Getting your creative mojo going is not limited to these things but attention to them does help get the juices flow, at least for me.

The most significant culprit keeping us creative people from making good shit is resistance.

If things aren't going your way then it's likely your focused on something that doesn't serve you. So the only thing for it is to put work aside and chill out.

That might seem like a very simple thing that could hardly be effective, however, I did say this was a simple solution.

to expand on this, here are a couple suggestions for how to improve creativity.

Use these empirically tested and verified tips from the American Psychological Asociation to open the door to creativity

Here are a few things you can do to help improve your creativity;

1. Relax, Chill Out

Find a way to get away from your work, that thing where you're stuck, and focus your mind on something unrelated. Don't just do it once, you've got to develop the habit. So every day, go for a walk, listen to easy music, whatever it takes. Get into the habit of this and you

2. Hit The Gym

Working out works for me. I really push myself hard to the point where it's almost like the me that is me is not there. All I feel is the pain in my legs, the heaving of my chest for oxygen, my nervous system going crazy. Pushing the body hard creates an absence of mind, just like I said above albeit a seemingly extreme one.

3. Meditate

If meditation is your bag then go for it. I'd certainly recommend it. Do it daily first thing in the morning before anyone else at home rises. That's usually a good time for me. I'm not religious about meditation, I do it maybe every other day but I've got to say that when I do it I generally have a better all round day.

Creativity Simply Is

Creativity simply is. It's the energy of the Universe, an apparent element of the creative force at work behind everything and it will have its way.

And so we are either in the flow of it or we are working against it.

We do it all, and at the same moment, it does us.

A cooperative arrangement you might say.

So I've offered a couple of means above whereby you can move to a more aligned state and subsequently get into the flow of creativity.

Try these simple things out, try your own. But no matter what, never be satisfied with being stuck.

Larry out.