For the past five years I’ve been developing, polishing, and pacing what I hope will eventually be my first novel. I’ve been writing and reading my whole life, but I’ve never put paper to pen long enough to write an entire novella. I can feel the story crying out to be written, and the voice of creativity shows no signs of holding its tongue.
As mentioned in my previous post A Forgotten Flame, I’ve been listening to a lot of podcasts again lately, and yesterday I listened to a podcast in which the host spoke about being productive as a writer. Most of what was said would probably be considered common sense to many; such as: “Read a lot, and write a lot.” Which is great advice, but also something that I’ve already heard, many times before.
What did fascinate me, to the extent that I immediately grabbed a notebook and pen to write down what I had heard, was the last point of advice that he gave. I won’t beat around the bush, so here it is:
Once a day, do something creative, and then write it down on your calendar. Keep on doing at least one creative thing a day, and eventually you won’t want to miss a “something creative” day because of all the positive, creative momentum that you’ve built up. The idea being that you’ll eventually reach a point in your life wherein each day will always provide you with a creative achievement to your name.
Now, it is worth mentioning that we all have different ideas of what constitutes as a creative achievement, and that’s great! Our creativity differs, which is kind of the defining characteristic of creativity.
Personally, this blog post is today’s creativity challenge. I’m a little sick. I’m not feeling well, and I have some work to catch up on, but gosh dangit, I’m writing this post!
Ultimately, the novel I write will be a collection of many days’ creative writings culminated into one story of epicosity. I know that’s not a word, but screw it, I’m sick.
So…
Are you feeling creatively frustrated?
Are you hungry for a creativity revival?
Are you someone who’s been waiting too long to get things done?
Well then…
Take it one step at a time. Or in this case, one creative gesture of symbolic freedom, at a time. Draw a picture, write a poem. Write a sentence. Whatever!
Dylan
10-09-2015
P.S. This damn cold better go away, or I’ll be forced to write about it.
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