Thursday, June 21, 2012

Creativity, how to get it and keep it!

A best seller I wrote in a haze of FLOW.
http://tinyurl.com/d3b8qxp.
     Most authors (painters, sculptors, poets, actors) adore their work. So much so that they seem to live in another time and space. This is true of me! I step into my work and call it FLOW.
     In the mornings when I sit down at my desk, FLOW comes quickly. And over the decades that I have written whether fiction or non, FLOW has happened more and more quickly for me. Yes, what used to take me 20 minutes, takes me two!
     But I have one problem. Or not. You tell me.
     If I have left a work for a long period of time, say 2 months, I have totally forgotten what the piece is about. BLANK. STARES. OVERCOME ME. I cannot even recall the names of the h/h.
     LAME?
     I used to worry about this. But no more. It is not age or stupidity that afflicts me. No, no. It is the way my brain works.
     Some artists can work on more than one creative piece at a time.
Not me!
     I have to totally walk into a story...or I cannot inhabit the protagonists' skins, cannot feel their pain or their sorrow, cannot know in my heart their challenges.
     How did I get this way?
     Practice.
When I first began to write, I had little people--three of them!--in diapers. I had moments, really, to find my center and write. Usually, that meant at five in the morning before anyone was up! Least of all, me!
This is about the woman who would become Lady Featherstone's sister-in-law!
http://tinyurl.com/8a8b9y7
Now, I arise when I wish. Ah. The joys of having adult children who live in their own homes! I write when I get to my desk, usually by 9. But I punch no clock. And I don't feel guilty about that, either. (TOO MANY years hitting journalistic deadlines and producing pieces for my corporate bosses had me creating on the spot. That, thank heavens, is done.) I produce now in my own good time.
    Even these current edits that I just cannot seem to start.... hmm.
    But I do know one good thing about creativity: Perhaps the reason I am not yet starting the edits is because I have not yet walked into the story once more. I have not fully grasped my editor's requested additions. I have not yet "seen" them with my Third Eye.
So. As Scarlett said, tomorrow is another day. Then I will edit with a fuller vision and greater understanding.
And in the meantime, I will do my little yoga, take a tiny walk, plant my impatiens that sit so patiently waiting for me to honor them with a bigger pot, for godssakes, please Cerise come do this, they say and wave to me from the garden!
After all that, I will edit.
In FLOW.
What does your FLOW look like, feel like? Do you enjoy it? Do you remember what happens in that delicious other universe of yours?

3 comments:

Unknown said...

My FLOW is just about the same. I do get up at 5am still and sometimes earlier. :)
Good luck with edits.

Unknown said...

I love it when my FLOW comes easily and it's at a time when I'm not going to be interrupted. Unfortunately it often hits when I have people begging for food...I also have times where I'm easily distracted by anything and everything...find myself mindlessly playing games of bejeweled. I do know that if the FLOW isn't coming easily my writing comes across as forced...i need to teach someone else to cook lol

Cerise DeLand said...

Constance! YES! Teach your kids to make salad, set table, bake potatoes, etc etc. It helps on the time FLOW.
And when they get older, they thank you!