Recharging Creativity ... Mine

     I am not excused from losing my Umph in my studio or between me and pen and paper. I am not excused from not bringing forth and asserting my creative drive  - my log jams between me and creativity are my doing - no person or thing is to blame.  Nope, I am just as human as the next human standing in line for inspiration. Some days I feel as if I am waiting for a special, unique, ordinary moment to move and inspire me. I feel like I wait for that something inside but that something remains elusive, just out of reach. In these moments of feeling flat within, I know I really need my creative switch flipped on along with the dam busted so my personal generative current flows unobstructed - again. I openly admit to experiencing days filled with long moments of sitting and staring at all my artsy, crafty objects/items/supplies and seeing absolutely nothing.  I walk into my gardens void of motivation, unable or unwilling to decide whether to weed or not to weed, or to gently till the earth or not, and the thought of dragging a hose is just too much to consider. I can't see zip or zilch  or zippo or crapo! I am unable and perhaps disinclined to see anything that is inspiring - the world looks flat! I can't make a decision about making a line or how to shade or choose a color or where to make a cut or whether to turn on my wood burners or even pick up a watering can ... I feel frozen inside. In those moments, the moments void of inspiration, where I have lost my creative battery's charge all I know is I am not flowing and glowing and expressing my metaphorical language of celebrating life. I feel heavy inside. I feel like stagnate water - still and murky. I sense my personal seconds slip through my life opportunities untouched and unused and we all know we can't bank our unused seconds, minutes, hours, and days!  Darn it!

What to do? In these empty moments I slowly move toward what I know is my personal anti-creativity antidote. When I become aware I am in the midst of a creative blockage (obvious by my lack of creativity!) I go soak in a wonderful hot bath imbued with herbs and salts.

(Photo by David Mesplé ... Submerged Within Ones Element)

     I soak - I relax. I embrace the sensual wetness of and the tingly sensation of salty water which is perfectly too hot and that hotness creates steamy air that envelops my soul. I submerge my body beneath liquid beauty letting the water's fluid body hold me ... I become weightless. I become void of physical sensation, void of the experience of my heavy body.  I let go and I let my awareness of lightness of being remove the blocks between me and myself. As the salts penetrate my pores and the gentle aromatics of the herbs penetrate my senses I release my physical and mental tensions letting the steamy hot water seduce my subconscious into exposing my pools of creativity and allow the opening of the flood gates. Gates open, soul open, mind open, heart open, the flow of my imagination begins to once again speak loudly to my conscious mind - I feel my switch within flip back on. I feel my creative juices moving, flowing, rushing, like a swift river carrying me back to where I forgot I was.  By the time I am done soaking in the hot fragrant water I am filled with wonderful imagery. I feel renewed. I have story after story speaking to me begging me to take down dictation notes to preserve all the nuances of characters from my past and I see color and shadows and lines and textures and designs and my plants also chime in, beckoning me to come play.  I recharge my creativity submerged within.

Hugs, 

Maryanne