THE ARTIST BLOG

HOW TO BE MORE CREATIVE

Here are four tips to be more creative in any medium.

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Today we're going to talk about how to open your creative channel more and more and more. I know a little bit about this. I've been a singer/songwriter for 30 years, a performing musician for 25 years and an artist coach for the last number of years helping all sorts of artists and creatives open up their creative channels. So if you're feeling brave, and want to put this in the chat, I welcome you to otherwise I just want you to write it down for yourself or think about yourself: "I would be more creative in my life if only..."

For many of us, we have this feeling like, "Who am I to be doing this creative idea that I have? Who am I? I'm not x enough, or I'm to y. If I had more time or more energy..." So it's like if I were more talented, if I were more creative or more original, I'd be I would create more or if I was not too old or too young, right? So we kind of have these feelings like in some ways, we're not entitled to be creative.

I think that the basis of that feeling is a feeling that creativity comes from me, it comes from us, like I had this idea to start a business, or to do painting or to write or sing, and it's my idea. But the truth is, what I'm here to tell you tonight is that creativity doesn't start from you. Creativity comes from something much, much, much bigger than all of us whenever your name is for that thing that that we're all a part of that's much bigger than all of us. Maybe it's God universe, Divine, shechina, spirit, whatever your word is. That's where creativity comes from. So, so this entity is actually asking us to partner with it in creating things in the world.

If you're into Jewish prayer at all, you may have noticed that every morning we say in Hebrew, today splittable, the whole young Talmud, that God or whatever your name for that is, is didn't just create the world one time, but is constantly creating the world every single day. And how does that happen? Part of that is through nature, the laws of physics, right? Like trees grow and grass grows. Nothing's the same from moment to moment. And those are laws that perpetuate. But there's another way that God is renewing the world every day and that's through us. That's through you, and that's through me. And that is through sending us creative impulses. And each of us has a creative channel through which HaShem (God) is sending me.You don't have access to my channel. I don't have access to Azi's channel, or Miriam's or Kat's or Margot's Justine, Martine... Each of us has our own channel, nobody else has access to it, you have access to your channel, and through that the Divine is asking you to manifest and create things in the world.

Alright, so today, I want to give you four ways to open your creative channel. I know that we're such a creative group here. And we're all building businesses so we're all already creating. I want to give you four tips to create more and more and more in your life. Alright, so this is like the 10 minute version right here.

Number One: Partnership. When you remember when you have this awareness that you're in partnership with the entire universe to make something and manifest and create in the world, it helps that feeling of, "Who am I to do this?" Well, you're actually the one that like theDivine tapped in particular to do this! So that may help with that feeling of being being so alone in it and also having a feeling that you don't might not deserve to do it.

Number Two: Consistency. There's a very important Jewish teaching, it's that you will have a makom kavua and a zman kavua - a set place and a set time. Since I graduated college in 1997, until a year ago, and I've rectified this, I have always always always had a music studio. And I'm not talking fancy. I'm talking for a long time it was the tiny walk in closet of my son's bedroom, that he would go to sleep and I would like sneak in and put on headphones and write music and then sneak out. So -- and I know this is a challenge with COVID -- but the question is, are you making a place that is yours that you could do this? And I'm not talking, maybe the next few months are crazy, because no one's in school. I'm talking about in your life. And I'm also talking about having a set time.

One client of mine is a therapist, a single mom, she has two kids, she has a dog, she has a very full life. Every Tuesday morning from 8:00 - 8:30am you will find her writing fiction, because that's what she needs for her life. So it doesn't have to be a lot of time, but she has a consistent time. You know, that friend you asked for coffee 20 times, and she said no to you every time and then after a while you're like, "I don't think she wants to be to hang out with me." So if you're not showing consistency in your where you are and your time, when a HaShem comes to ask you to do things, HaShem's going to be like, "Actually, she's not taking it very seriously, I'm going to ask this person over here." So the more you're consistent, the more the Divine is tapping you with fresh ideas.

I just want to clarify, when we're talking about this creative channel, I don't know if any of you have had this experience of literally channeling something when you think, "DidI just write that? I don't even remember writing it, or I just drew this. And it was like, there was no time." We're talking about that experience of flow, and just channeling where you might not even have to do so much of the work. So this is really what I'm talking about with this partnership that you're allowing to come through.

Number Three: Work. We hit on this a few weeks ago, this idea of doing the work and we brought up this idea of Malcolm Gladwell decided it takes 10,000 hours to master anything. Who knows if that's the number, but when HaShem started sending me songs, I actually, I couldn't play an instrument, I couldn't read music, I couldn't sing really, I was like, "Alright, now it's now I have this passion to start learning how to do these things." So everyone here is clearly doing the work. Because we're all in this mastermind. We're all here to learn from Azi and learn from each other. You would never hire a partner foryour business who isn't serious about their chops and about getting excellent at what they do. The it's, it's the same in this partnership with HaShem, that you want to be excellent at what you do, and put in the work to become really good at it.

Number Four: Service. I stood on stage for years, and I was like: Look at me, me, me, me, me, I want you to love me, I want you to respect me, I want you to think I'm talented, I have to be perfect at what I'm doing on a stage. Because you are looking at me and thinking about me." So that is one way that you can be on stage. When I say stage, it's an actual stage. It's a proverbial stage, it's a zoom stage, it's a workshop. It's a Facebook post. It's a mailing list. It's when it's when you're leading people. So you can lead from ego. Or you can stand on stage in service in service of your customer, in service of your audience and be thinking: "You, you, you, you you, how can I lessen your burden? How can I take my expertise and help you? How can I help you feel less alone? How can I help you with your health? How can I help you with your mental health?" whatever you have to offer. So having done both of these myself have saved you 1000's of hours of hardship and just tell you when you do things from a place of ego, it's filled with pain. And when you do things from a place of service, it's filled with joy. So save yourself the ego side and go straight to service.

In conclusion, I want to I want you to think about this: In what ways are you heeding the call to be a partner with the Divine in creating the world. I know our time is is compact tonight, so I would be very thrilled to continue the conversation with each and every one of you feel free to email me. julie@juliegeller.com.