We all have a higher mind and access it all the time whether we know it or not. The trick is being able to call on it at will, to get the idea when you need it. There are ways and, as a practitioner and former teacher of yoga for many decades, i'd like to share a few simple steps to creativity:
1. Get all the data you need for whatever you want to create. When i write magazine articles, this may be pages of technical data. For a novel, i do my research and outline my characters. The idea here is to have the higher mind flow by giving it the tools it needs to build the idea.
2. Do something else. Stop thinking about your project to the extent possible. The ideas may float through your mind. Let them, but go for a walk, take in a movie, have a nap, something. Showers are good, so is driving. Your lower mind will be somewhat involved and get out of the way of the higher mind. As you get better at this technique, the break may be shorter -- a trip to the kitchen for a glass of water.
3. With no real expectations, sit in front of your work site -- computer, note pad, easel. Gaze at the screen or canvas and watch. Something will flash or float into your mind. It may be words, a way to start the article. It may be dialogue for a book. It may be colors or a motif for a painting. Go with it. It will take you forward.
I have worked with this technique for so long that, once i'm firmly on the right track for a magazine article, i don't have to do much rewriting. Fiction, of course, is more layered. You come back in waves and add richness and detail.
But try this simple technique and see if it works for you. Let me know.Do you have other techniques for being creative on demand? Share. : )
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Excellent advice. My best ideas usually come when I'm not thinking about them. But sometimes, I like to just start writing, word after word after word. It may not be any good, but there's always backspace, and it pushes me into what I'm writing. From there, ideas and words come out a lot better.
ReplyDeleteYes, great technique. Actually, as you push the words out you're challenging the critical "chopping up" nature of the lower mind and allowing your inspiration to shine through. Thanks for your comment. : ) Tara
ReplyDeleteI keep a pen and paper beside the bed, and in my purse as well as a PDA. Things come to me when I'm driving, and I often have to find somewhere to pull off the road and make notes. It usually takes me a minute or so to jot down enough to make sense. If I don't put enough detail, when I get home I have a note saying something along the lines of "bar scene crash glass fight" Ooooh so helpful! Not. >_<
ReplyDeleteOne thing that helped me with a current book (which is in a series) is to go back and read a passage of the previous book. Revisit the characters and fall in love with them again. I also keep notes for ideas in a document for each book. For a series, in one doc that combines all books so I can use notes that don't end up in one as a springboard for ideas in the 2nd, 3rd, etc.
I've referred to what you call the higher mind as "the back burner" for years. By any other name... it works!
Hi Kayelle -- Great suggestions. I love the idea of keeping notes in a document for each book. Going to try that. Also, i recently read a suggestion that a writer should go back after writing and do an outline of the main details of a book that will be a series so she doesn't have to flip though the previous book to find character's names and the month events occurred, etc. I haven't had the patience to do it so far, but i really see the wisdom in it since i'm writing a series currently and am doing a lot of looking back. Thanks again for your comment. : )
ReplyDeleteBeautiful tip, Tara. For years I have immediately captured the buddhi stream of thoughts on tape just after they occurred as well as while they stream in. For a couple years now, the Voice Notes feature of my BlackBerry has improved this process. I even take it into my daily meditations (ringer off) and capture buddhi streams as I cross over them on the way in and out of deep meditation. The great thing about the BlackBerry Voice Note feature is that I download my daily 5 - 10 daily dictations straight to my computer for immediate transcription. Oh, oh! The Buddhi and BlackBerry, sounds like a commercial or, better yet, characters in the new techno-erotic genre. "The buddhi whistered softly, sweetly into my BlackBerry a sugestion so provocative that the hairs on my neck stood instantly erect." Oh, how I digress!
ReplyDeleteNew character names!! Thank you, oh Godfather, for your wonderful tip. I have to explore the voice notes feature on my Blackberry. Sounds really useful. : )
ReplyDeleteI like the technique. I think I may do something a little like this, but since I have never thought it through, I sometimes try to push without being prepared, for example. Thanks!
ReplyDeleteYes, Ben, i think many of us do this without realizing it. Nice to know we can help it along. : )
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