What kind of daily creative practice do you have and how has that changed your life?

Two weeks ago I committed to writing everyday and posting whatever I create on my website blog. I’m happy to report it’s going well and is even surprisingly exciting. It may be early to share any results, but I have started to realize some things.

The value of daily creative practice - Reminds me of the routine of an Austin artist who has been on my podcast, Austin Art Talk. Charles Heppner puts a priority on painting and writing every day. It seems consistency is important if you want to make progress and defy the blocked times of doubt and fear. Here is something I wrote about him at the time of his interview. “Years of making work along with daily creative discipline and a journaling practice have given him the confidence to ask better questions to explore through his art and at the same time not be attached to finding an answer. Give up control and follow your heart.”

Letting go - Feels similar in a way to morning pages which is one of the tasks in The Artist’s Way that I have always liked. You just do it, ideally without much judgment, and in the case of my blog, publish it and move on. It’s just not possible to spend time tweaking and editing each post indefinitely. This has been very hard for me because I want every post to be as good as possible. Even down to how it visually looks on the page, sometimes putting a lot of effort into tweaking all the elements very minutely. Just keep moving forward!

Clarifying and expanding my thoughts and connections - It’s easy to have an idea or see a connection in your head and leave it at that. Taking the time to write and share about it in a way that makes sense can be a lot of work. For me, there is sometimes resistance to putting in that effort. Most of the time it ends up being worth every minute. 

The compounding interest of creation - I’d like to think when you create consistently over a long period of time that it adds up to something greater and can foster new opportunities. You discipline yourself to do the work and once it’s out in the world who knows what might happen or who might see it. I feel very optimistic about that aspect of this challenge.  

Writing is fun - Language and words are just so interesting to work with and craft. Expressing a theory, sharing a story, or just writing a poem. It’s something I am liking more than I anticipated and that is a very good thing when you need to do it every day.