Since creativity is not easy to measure, you can’t consistently quantify your daily creative effort beyond the simple question: Did I show up today? Showing up means arriving at the studio or desk or workspace ready and willing to do the work as required. Some days, what is required may be the joyful task of […]

The phrase “beginner mind” ran through my head this morning while I considered how to approach my photography challenge today — and what to post here on the blog in terms of relating the challenge to creativity.  Here’s the rub: Although I have taken thousands of photographs over the years, and sold hundreds of them, they […]

  The more I read and experience and observe creative people, the more I notice how we get in our own way and limit our creativity by imposing rules about the conditions we require in order to create. We might be convinced we can only create using specific tools or in a certain setting or […]

I hate to bring up the subject of creative anxiety twice in one week and then not offer a coping exercise! In his self-help creativity manual Coaching the Artist Within, psychologist Eric Maisel suggests we learn to appreciate what he terms the “Tao of Anxiety” and thus coach ourselves through it. It is, as are […]

As Eric Maisel explains in his expert creativity manual Coaching the Artist Within, anxiety can be a tricky thing for creative people. Sometimes fear serves as a valuable alert, sometimes as a false alarm. But how can you tell the difference? And what can you do about it? Symptoms of Anxiety First of all, you […]

In his self-help creativity guide, Coaching the Artist Within, psychologist Eric Maisel devotes an entire chapter to Anxiety. Certainly some anxieties are rooted in the irrational, but creative people often experience reality-based, rational fears. What happens, for example, if we perform badly, or our book does not sell, or no gallery will represent us? These […]

Deep in Chapter 8 of Eric Maisel’s Coaching the Artist Within, we come across a nugget on identifying and dealing with perfectionism. Maisel argues that we are culturally conditioned to value a high gloss perception of perfection over reality. Reality, of course, includes both glossy and matte, highs and lows, successes and failures, perfection and […]

Are you committed to the process of making art, or are you one of those creative types who, as Eric Maisel describes in Coaching the Artist Within, would much rather imagine that other (lucky!) people’s creative projects finish themselves joyfully and magically by effortless genius while you, meanwhile, refuse to get out of bed? Dilemma: […]

Creating in the middle of things is admittedly not easy and often difficult, fraught with all kinds of risks and fears and do-ability issues. If “Just do it NOW!” doesn’t push you to take action, then you may need to work on some strategies to help yourself get moving. In Coaching the Artist Within, creativity […]

In his creativity book Coaching the Artist Within, Eric Maisel insists we need to get a grip on our mind, take charge of our own self talk. We talk to ourselves all the time, and all too often what we are saying in our self-talk is not helpful. We talk ourselves out of creating, out […]