The Proper Care and Feeding of Your Imagination
My oldest was 4.5 months old & it was my birthday. My partner decided to gift me with a poppy for the garden (he didn’t know that they are a pain in the ass).
My first thought wasn’t gratitude for the beautiful gift. No, my first thought was: Are you fucking kidding me?! ANOTHER thing to keep alive?!
I can imagine you might have a similar response to today’s topic. After all, the proper care & feeding of our families is hard enough!
If you don’t feed yourself, you might experience that hungry and angry state known as ‘hangry’. If you don’t feed your imagination, it also gets ‘hangry’. And it lashes out – at you. First, though, it warns you: you may feel restless, that state where you can’t get no satisfaction. You might feel apathy: the second you think you have some free time for creativity, suddenly you’re asleep on the couch. After that, it’s ‘hangry’. You have daydreams of terrible things. You are overly harsh and critical towards yourself (but you say you’re “being realistic”). Nothing you do seems right.
Your imagination needs a snack.
How do we feed our imaginations? With all kinds of content, experiences, sensations. We take in, inhale, absorb, nourish ourselves. And later, we transform that into creative energy.
You wouldn’t expect yourself to run a marathon without training and proper nutrition. Why would you expect to leap into a creative project without the same preparation?
Below are some strategies for feeding your imagination. Today, give your imagination a tasty snack. Let us know how it goes and suggest other ideas at www.facebook.com/QuietStormsCO
- Julia Cameron (The Artist’s Way – affiliate link) suggests a weekly “artist’s date”.
- Go to a bookstore & look at magazines you normally wouldn’t look at.
- Go to a department store perfume counter & smell, hold the bottles, look at the packaging.
- Visit a type of store you’d typically never shop at.
- Go to the fabric store & touch fabrics. Maybe bring home some samples.
- Attend readings, gallery openings; visit museums, zoos, and tourist attractions (unironically).
- Collect inspiring quotes
- Open the dictionary & find a word with multiple meanings. Consider definition #3. Then search for synonyms & antonyms.
- Go for a walk.
- Listen to a different radio station every time you get in the car/cook/whatever.
- Go on a “nerd safari”. Pick a topic & Google it. Start following links. See how far afield you can get from your original topic.
- Pick a color first thing in the morning. Look for that color all day. Where do you see it? What associations do you have with that color? If you were to act like that color, how would you? (How do you brush your hair as spring green? Does muddy brown actually drive the speed limit?)