How To Create When the Brain Feels Like It Has Stopped...

This is the most challenging season for me, and it makes it difficult to get motivated to do ANYTHING! I am getting ready for a large life change (retirement, here I come, kicking and screaming and trying to pretend that I know what I'm doing) that is adding stressor after stressor after stressor. My brain is struggling with all sorts of things, so I am taking out my self-care and brain sparking routines to help me get started on some creative projects.

When I find myself in a creativity slump, the only thing that really works to get me feeling inspired or remotely interested in composing or drawing or making things for my music therapy clinic is to create using rules. The rules are arbitrary, made up by me, and something that I can break at any time if inspiration takes hold. I have found that my rules for creating help me break out of a stagnant state.

When I am in need of some new songs, I break out my composition kit and my rules. Chance composition is the best technique for me when I need to get out of a rut. Check out a post about chance composition here. The post includes some of my rules, but the biggest rule of them all is "THERE IS NO WRONG!"

One of the things that my brain does is criticize every little thing I do when I am in a slump. My inner critic is especially loud when I am in a funk. So, when I start to create, I tell myself (sometimes over and over again), "There is no wrong." This means that everything that I make or create has a purpose at some time in my life. If I make something out of paper that is not to my taste, I have learned that other people appreciate that thing. It always amazes me how things work out that way. If I compose a song that does not really spark my creativity in one composition session, it usually works out in another. So, I keep it all recorded someplace.

Jump starting my brain is not easy, but I find that having my rules helps. Right now, I am feeling the usual summer blues as well as anxiety and excitement over my upcoming future changes. This has made my brain very jittery. So, it is time to get back into my routines.

Today is Friday, and I do not work on Fridays for the next three weeks. I am going to dedicate these three Fridays for creative pursuits. The task in front of me today is to make some of the projects that I am going to offer in our upcoming creativity camp on July 18th and 19th. Going through the physical actions needed to create the song lyric board, the choice board, the monster faces, the game, and the Mad-Libs format will help me with writing the task analyses and give me some pictures to put together to help promote this CMTE/learning experience. Again, nothing is wrong with what I make, so I will be making things, refining things, putting things aside, and putting my brain to work.

Another technique that helps my brain get going is to set specific goals and objectives. No wishy-washy stuff here. I need a set goal. For example, by the end of today, I want to have finished a choice board and a game board and their respective task analyses. I will use my brain focus trick of working on this task for 30 minutes and then moving to do some chores for 30 minutes. As I am doing this, I have a television show in the background to keep me company.

Time to get my materials ready for this day of creating things. I have a structure, I have my plan, and I have the time. Happy Friday!

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