Satisfying Your Creative Urges

Whether or not we consider ourselves creative types, creativity fuels our lives every day. It’s how we solve problems, from the mundane to the extraordinary. It’s how we connect to one another. It’s how we see the humor in life, especially when life is not so funny.

Our creativity is like a little kid. Like a little kid, our creativity needs care. She (yeah, my creative spirit is a girl…maybe yours is a guy or both or neither…substitute pronouns as needed) needs to be well fed and rested. She needs a little discipline so she doesn’t run out into traffic or stick a fork in the outlet. And, maybe most importantly, our creativity needs room to play.

Just remember that little kids rarely need anything elaborate to play.

 Sometimes all they need is something small.

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Or something yummy to eat.

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Maybe a chance to play in the dirt.

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And get messy.

When give our creativity room to play, we fuel ourselves up. We’re ready for whatever life throws at us. We can solve problems easily and enjoy ourselves while we’re at it. We can leap tall buildings in a single bound. We can laugh in the face of danger…

No…wait…that’s a different post. And we probably shouldn’t laugh in the face of danger. Danger gets offended easily.

At any rate, when we fire up our creativity there’s (almost) nothing we can’t do.

My creativity likes to run amok in the kitchen and garden…but hates to clean up.

How do you indulge your creative inner-kid?

Image Attribution (In Order of Appearance):
Paintbrushes by John-Morgan, on Flickr CC BY 2.0
A Simpler Time by thephotographymuse, on Flickr CC BY 2.0
Strawberry face. (Sorry, i’m joking) by Martino!, on Flickr CC BY-ND 2.0
Gardening Blog Photo1 by USDAgov, on Flickr CC BY-ND 2.0
Fingerpainting 7 by timailius, on Flickr CC BY-NC 2.0
.messy. by JeMaSiDi, on Flickr CC BY-NC-ND 2.0

Possibly Probably Related articles

• Thoughts on Creativity (thedailypoon.wordpress.com)
• Creativity in Everyday Life (goodlifecoaching.com)
• On Passing Along Creativity To Our Kids (labeldaddy.com)
• Cultivate Creativity in Everyday Life (scientificamerican.com)
• Creativity can be a scary word (thecre8tivenative.com)
• Keeping the Creative Juices Flowing (reviveyourcreativity.com)
• How to Cultivate Creativity and Encourage Innovation (fashionablymarketing.me)

Zombie Cupcakes: Goodies with Bite

Some of you might be thinking “Oh no! Not another zombie post.” What can I say, I saw the brain cupcakes and couldn’t resist sharing.

Plus, I know I’m not the only sicko here.

Enjoy…

Just When You Thought It Was Safe to Go Out in the Garden

Look Out! Zombie Garden Gnomes on the Loose.

You saunter outside in your People of Walmart sweats pajamas, eyes still bleary from sleep, hair sticking up, trying to wash the morning breath away with coffee and whiskey. The sun is shining. The birds are singing. There’s a rustling in the bushes.

A rustling in the bushes?!

You turn to see what it is and come face to face with…

My Little Brony

Rainbow Brite custom MLP by Smantha Claridge as featured on Blog.Spoon Graphics (see link below).

Recently, when we talked about our favorite Saturday morning cartoons, the topic of bronies came up. What are bronies? Bronies are teen/adult male fans of My Little Pony, or MLP (and now I’m hearing Will Smith’s MIB…thank you very much). You know, bro + pony = brony.

And, then, a little light bulb went off…hey, my son is a brony too. Okay, he’s only six, so maybe it doesn’t really count. But he does love the MLPs.

How Does Creativity Really Work?

Gary Gauthier is at the Life List Club today talking about creativity…

All you need for an excellent exercise that stimulates a young child’s imagination is a blank sheet of paper and a few crayons of different colors. A creative spirit and busy little hands will do the rest. It’s not so easy for us adults! While creativity can be as easy as child’s play, for an artist or a craftsman, creativity can mean painstaking work.

Read more here.

Head on over and join the conversation.

There’s a Story Here Somewhere: Inspirational Images from Flickr

*Looking for the Summer (June – August) Writing Challenge – Every Picture Has a Story? See below for details.*

Flickr is my favorite site to scout for images to use on my blog. There’s a wealth of Creative Commons licensed images and it’s easy to search for them. The images vary widely in quality and artistic value but I’ve rarely failed to find just the right one for a post.

And, of course, it’s all free…which might be the most important factor to a blogger who isn’t making money off her blog.

My Favorites stream over there is already jammed with more images than I can use in a couple of years but I just keep adding more. So many of the images I’ve encountered have captured my imagination, inspiring blog posts, stories and stories-to-be. Here are some that have really stuck with me even though they have no story…yet:

April-May Writing Challenge: First Impressions and Famous Last Words

Great opening lines draw us in, making it impossible for us to turn away and great last lines linger long, long after we’ve read the end. Two of my favorite first and last lines come from Stephen King’s work.

“The man in Black fled across the Desert, and the Gunslinger followed.”  The Gunslinger (1982). Ooh…I know I want to follow them both. Don’t you?

“lady fingers they taste like lady fingers.” Survivor Type (1982). That one even makes my husband shiver and he’s never read the story.

Your challenge, should you choose to accept it, is to write either the opening or closing lines of a story. Start us off with a bang or leave us begging for more. As usual, any genre will do and the word count limit is 100.

Here’s how it all works:

• Prompt: Create the first or last line of a story.
• Genre: Anything goes. Mystery, Western, romance, historical fiction, alternate history, steam punk, science fiction, horror, fantasy, slip-stream, or whatever.
• Word count: 100 words.
• How to share: You can put it up on your blog and link here or (if you don’t have a blog) you can email (sonia DOT m DOT writes AT gmail DOT com) it to me and I’ll put it in a post for you.
• Time limit: From now until the next challenge is posted in June.
• Prizes: No…no prizes. Just the reward of a story well written.

There were some fabulous stories for the March Writing Challenge. I’ll be updating this post with links to them all shortly. In the mean time, cruise on over and read them here (in the comments).

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I’ll posting over at the Life List Club tomorrow. Come on by and say hello.

Image Attribution (In Order of Appearance):
keyboard ~ blur by striatic, on Flickr CC BY 2.0

Fear Not by Marcia Richards

 Welcome to another Life List Club Friday! Today, I’m guest blogging at Pam Hawely’s blog and we have the lovely Marcia Richards with us once more. Take it away, Marcia!

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Thank you, Sonia, for being a gracious hostess. In keeping with your Fear Friday theme, I offer your readers a post about fear.

Fear Not

Fear will stop us in our tracks, no matter what we were planning to do. Fear can show up disguised as uncertainty or procrastination.