Looking to boost creativity? Need some inspiration to get you thinking creatively? Want to open your heart and mind to new ideas? Look no farther, we have four magical creativity exercises to help you. They are fun, easy and will result in a massive creativity surge if you give one, or more, a try.
We’ve also got some ideas to put you into a creative frame of mind, so that you are more receptive to inspiration.
1. Translate an Image Into Words
Find a painting or photograph that resonates with you. Without describing it, translate it into words. For example, looking at the painting above:
Soar, deep, fresh, refresh, clear, tidal, craggy, freedom, wing, horizon, blue, cold, water, ocean, ozone, timeless, relax, absorb, think, look, observe, spontaneity, breathe, inhale, exhale, soul, invigorate.
If you are musical, you could try and ‘play the picture’, or if you are artistic, you could translate the figurative into the abstract. Paint the feeling of what you see in your chosen image.
Do this as often as you can and you will find yourself observing the world around you with a creative explorer’s eye.
2. Find Faces
Take your camera or smart phone and take a slow tour of your home. You are looking for faces: human, humanoid, monstrous, or animal. Not in the obvious places like books or children’s toys but on the walls, hidden in the tile, brickwork, garden wall, or peeling paint of an external door. Anywhere there is texture, you’ll find faces. This is because the human brain is programmed to make sense of random patterns and faces are one of those things that we look for. Faces in clouds, in a camp fire, in a carelessly thrown down garment, in your cat’s markings, or perhaps the bark of a tree. When you consciously go looking for them, you’ll find them. Photograph them for posterity.
This exercise will help you to see patterns in all kinds of things. If you are involved in the visual arts, you will learn to find inspiration in your surroundings wherever you are.
3. Matchstick Sculpture
Grab a box of matches or a pack of toothpicks, take a little Blutack, Plasticine or modeling clay and create a small sculpture. It doesn’t have to be anything recognizable. Make a group of them. Put some time aside for the exercise and lose yourself in it. This transports you back to childhood, when you played and created with no notion of time or pressure to produce something perfect.
4. Imaginary Animals
Artist, Carla Sonheim has a quirky, imaginative style which is instantly recognizable. One of the creative exercises she teaches involves making a random shape on paper and turning it into an imaginary animal.
Try this fast exercise. Draw six or seven random blob shapes. Without thinking too hard about it, transform the blobs into creatures. If you enjoyed it, make more, or maybe spend some time coloring and making them into cute animals.
Creativity Exercises: Mood Enhancers
Surround Yourself With Blue
An experiment carried out for the journal ‘Science’ discovered that people thought more creatively when working in a room with walls painted blue. If you can’t paint your walls any time soon, place a few blue objects near you when you need to think creatively. If your software allows it, change the theme or skin to your favorite shade of blue.
Watch a Comedy
Your mood affects your creativity – seems obvious when you think about it. You are more likely to be creatively at your best when your mood is light and happy. Although, some people’s best work has been produced from extremely dark mindsets.
If you are aiming for creative thinking mode, where your mind is required to range widely and come up with imaginative ideas, then watch a funny movie or TV show. Alternatively spend some time joking with friends and colleagues. People report that the best commercial ideas have surfaced when they were just messing about while gently holding their focus on the outcome. Smiles work better than furrowed brows.
Smell Your Way to Creativity
Having a scented candle or oil burner nearby is supposed to help creativity. The three best scents are rosemary, cinnamon or vanilla. Rosemary is best for an instant mood lift. Cinnamon and vanilla are renowned for soothing anxiety and worry, thus freeing the mind for creative endeavors.
Try this with any of the preceding exercises to see if it makes a difference.
Create in the Shower
Or the bath tub. Have a waterproof notebook and pen nearby to capture those ideas that seem to pop into your head during a shower. The reason this happens is because a shower or relaxing bath soothes you into a meditative state so your mind is free to roam. It feels like those ideas come from nowhere. Whatever. Write them down before you lose them.
Creative Switchwords
We’ve written about Switchwords before, and their usefulness for psychics. They are also good for creativity. Simple to use, all you do is say them aloud, whisper them, think them or write them down. Repeat your chosen word/s at least five times, and as much as you like throughout the day.
- Curve: to create beauty
- Divine: to enhance your strengths
- Elate: to turn a setback to a creative positive opportunity
- Giggle: to get in the mood to write
- Judge: to improve understanding
- Now: to act on a positive thought
- Reach: to remember; to find a spark of creativity
- Together: for working in collaboration.
Crystals for Creativity
Judy Hall recommends blue lace agate for connecting your spirit to your intellect and to promote creativity. Other crystals linked to creativity are: citrine, tigers eye, carnelian, garnet and lapis lazuli.
Keep your preferred crystal near you when you want to get creative.
We hope we’ve sparked your imagination with these creativity exercises and creative mood enhancers. We’d love to hear your favorite method of putting yourself into creative mode.
Images via Pixabay and author.