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5 Ways to Meditate Without Actually Meditating

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October 29, 2015

5 Ways to Meditate Without Actually Meditating

“Enlightenment is bringing a state of meditativeness into the smallest acts of your day to day life in it’s expression of grace, harmony, balance, beauty, each and every movement of the body, each and every act… do it totally perfectly , harmoniously, with your total attention and love and you will see that your deepest center starts connecting to each and every act of yours. This is how you bring the buddha to your life.” ~ Osho

Ok, so we’ve all heard by now that we should be meditating. Doctors and medical professionals in the west are now recognizing it for it’s healing properties and calming effects on the body.

However, what many people may not know is that you don’t actually have to “meditate” to meditate. Meaning… you don’t technically have to sit cross-legged, with palms facing up chanting “ommmmmmm” in a room of complete silence to get the health benefits of a meditation practice.

This is good news for a lot of people, especially since a big part of the population have either never tried meditation, because it still just seems too weird, or have tried it and were able to do it for a minute or two before their pesky little mind stepped and said, “ok, this is getting too weird/boring/out there…. I need to stop.”

So don’t feel bad if you are part of the population that doesn’t seem to be able to grasp this whole meditation thing.

Anyone who has been doing it for a while will tell you that it takes practice to be able to sit still and quiet the mind for extended periods of time, and even then… the conventional method of meditation is not for everyone.

Our bodies and minds do however, need some method of release and relaxation where we are able to de-stress and relax.

Here are some other ways we are able to “meditate without actually meditating” ~

“Don’t meditate to fix yourself, to heal yourself, to improve yourself, to redeem yourself; do it as an act of love, deep warm friendship to yourself. In this way there is no longer any need for the subtle aggression of self-improvement, for the endless guilt of not doing enough. It offers a possibility to the end of the ceaseless round of trying so hard that wraps so many people’s lives in a knot. Instead there is now meditation as an act of love. How endlessly delightful and encouraging.” ~ Bob Sharples, Meditation and Relaxation in Plain English

1) Cook Something

Food is what we nourish our bodies with. We quite literally, are what we eat. Whether you are making something healthy or maybe you are baking a comforting treat for yourself, if you bring presence and love into your cooking you can use cooking as a method of creative meditation.

Focusing on the way we chop the vegetables, spice and season the food just right and then finally plating the food so that it quite literally becomes a visual representation of deliciousness can all be ways that we meditate as we cook. The food that we put in our bodies and that we feed to our friends and family becomes an act of love and friendship.

2) Exercise/ Take a Walk

Yoga is probably the first method of exercise that comes to mind when we think of bringing presence into a physical activity. And while yoga is undoubtedly a wonderful way to bring our attention to the subtle nuances of our body’s movements, it’s not the only way.

In fact, any exercise can be used to love our bodies in an active meditation. Weight lifting, taking a walk, or dancing are all ways that we can move our body and focus on each movement in such a way that we can actually relax while at the same time getting our heart rate up.

Exercising is another act of love towards our own self, so find which way to exercise best suits you and get moving!

3) Sleep

“Sleep is the best meditation.” ~ Dalai Lama

Yes, that’s right.. now you have an excuse to get some more sleep. During sleep our conscious mind takes a rest while our subconscious mind gets to play out and sift through any stresses that our conscious mind did not get to during the day.

Sometimes situations are so stressful that our waking mind does not want to deal with them, so it stuffs these emotions down so that it doesn’t have to think about them and during sleep we are able to deal with these hard to deal with emotions.

For those of us who can’t seem to quiet the mind no matter what, sleep becomes an imperative part of our lives. It becomes the only time in which we are able to de-clutch from our thoughts and truly relax our body, which makes good, quality sleep (meaning sleep with no noise in the background and where we are able to slip into REM sleep) a necessity not just a luxury.

4) Make Art

Art can really be anything these days. It’s not only limited to drawing, sculpting and painting anymore. It can be photography, making a collage, putting on your makeup, sewing, among any number of things. Anytime we create something new we are tapping into the “vortex”, which means we are connecting to source energy.

And anytime we are connected to source energy we are quite literally feeding our soul with what it needs. When we focus on creating something with our hands or voices or instruments or whatever, we turn off our “logical” mind and tap into our imagination.

This can be an act of meditation because creating something can be a highly relaxing activity.

5) Breathe

“Breathing in I calm my body. Breathing out, I smile. Dwelling in the present moment, I know this is a wonderful moment.” ~ Thich Nhat Hahn

Ironic how the easiest and most effortless thing we do on a day to day basis is actually the one thing that is the most beneficial. When we connect to, focus and become our breath we do the absolute most effective thing in relaxing our minds and bodies.

Every moment becomes another chance to meditate, and when we focus on our breathing we actually are able to deal with life in a calmer and a more responsive (as opposed to reactive) manner.

Breath is life, and at a certain point in our spiritual journey we realize that life is meditation. All of life. The only way to come to this realization is to become our breath.

Meditate without actually meditating

Find Stillness in Motion 🌿 5 Ways to Find Everyday Zen

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Breathe
Julia C R Gray

Axis Mundi ~ Understanding the Connection Between Heaven & Hell

Sonali Bansal

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October 29, 2015

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Axis Mundi ~ Understanding the Connection Between Heaven & Hell

“No tree, it is said, can grow to heaven, unless its roots reach down to hell.” ~ Carl Jung

Universal consciousness connects all that there is and this cosmic connection between heaven and hell, high and low, and the different dimensions is the Axis Mundi. This connecting link or metaphysical axis is a symbol found in every religion, in every place, or in mythology.

It’s like a spine that holds together all of the realms from lowest to highest with the human world in the center. Axis Mundi is also referred as the tree of life, the center of the Earth, World axis, world pillar and so on.

William F. Romain stated in his book, Shamans of the Lost World: A Cognitive Approach to the Prehistoric Religion, “Cross Culturally, the Axis Mundi is expressed in many different ways. In some cultures the Axis Mundi is symbolized as the ‘world tree’ that links the upper and the lower worlds. Other cultures visualize the Axis Mundi as a column or pillar. Yet other describes it as a cosmic mountain. In many cases, the Axis Mundi is symbolized as temples, cities and palaces.”

Different cultures represent the axis mundi with different symbols such as a mountain, a tree, a vine, a column of smoke or fire, or even a tower, a staircase, a totem pole, a pillar, a spire, etc.

Here are some interpretations of the Axis Mundi across different cultures.

Axis Mundi in Hinduism

Vedas, Upanishads, and Puranas speak of Axis Mundi in many chapters and customs. The Katha Upanishad describes it as “eternal asvattha (in spiritual literature, this tree is represented as the Upside-down tree with roots exposed above. It is called the Tree of Samsara. Asvattha is the Sanskrit name for the Peepal or fig tree) whose roots rise on high and whose branches grow low. It is pure, the brahman, what is called non-death. All the world rests in it.”

Even in mythological tales, Mount Meru in India and Mount Kailash in Tibet are considered to be the Axis Mundi, the closest point where Earth and sky unite and a clear communication can take place.

Axis Mundi in Shamanism

Shamans travel in time and space to heal and retrieve soul pieces and gather wisdom from other realms. The mystic science of shamanism believes in the presence of Axis Mundi, the central pathway connecting the upper, middle and the lower world, as well as the four dimensions, which allows the shamanic healer to travel in different realms.

H.S. Webb in Exploring Shamanism: Using Ancient Rites to Discover the Unlimited Healing Powers of Cosmos and Consciousness, mentioned that a shaman detaches from his/her ego self and enters a state of possibility. “In this space, a cancerous tumor can shrink and disappear within moments. In this space, the shaman can see the location of the missing child…It is in this place of all –time and no-time, of all space and no-space, that magic is translated into physical world. The space where this happens is known by many names, here called the Axis Mundi, the central pillar of the world.”

Axis Mundi in Buddhism

The Buddha represented the axis mundi, and the Bodhi Tree under which he gained enlightenment serves as image of the Axis Mundi. The tree is considered to be the reconciliation of macrocosm and microcosm.

The book Relics, Ritual, and Representation in Buddhism: Rematerializing the Sri Lankan Theravada Tradition by Kevin Trainor stated, “by bringing a branch of the Bodhi tree to Lanka, the island itself became part of this axiality.” Even the Stupas are considered to be the celestial pole, where communication between higher and lower realms is possible. Just like staircases rising up to the sky are present in various sacred places depicts the rise of the soul to heaven.

Axis Mundi in Human Beings

Situated between the upper and the lower realms, human beings are considered to be a form of Axis Mundi themselves. The whole chakra system is based on the concept of cosmic pole, where the practitioner with the help of meditation can reach a state of nothingness. Its believed that the human body is a temple and with prayer the gap between the two extremes can be bridged. Leonardo Da Vinci’s Vitruvian man represented a symbolic and mathematical exploration of the human form as world axis.

Axis Mundi in Nature

Nature is the biggest teacher to mankind, and through various means it keeps reminding us of the sacred designs and concepts. There have been sacred mountains considered to be the Axis Mundi in various religions. Apart from the two spoken above, Mount Fuji in Japan, Mount Zion from ancient Hebrew, Mount Olympus in Greek mythology and Sioux take the Black Hills as the axis mundi.

Many Hindu temples are placed on high mountain peaks like Vaishno Devi, Amarnath, Tirupati & many more, which shows that the mountains are a sacred place for cosmic union. Mountains act as a perfect gateway for free communication between the two poles and balancing the energy. This is the reason why those seeking eternal bliss have to go to the mountains to begin their spiritual journey.

On the other hand, trees also represent the center of the world. Anther symbolic representation of Axis Mundi is through the cosmic tree, whose branches are the sky, earth is the trunk and the roots are underworld, which depict all the three dimensions. The Bhagavad Gita calls the Banyan tree the Axis Mundi, known as “Ashwath Vrikasha” meaning ‘I am Banyan tree among trees’. In ancient mythology, some of the trees of life known across cultures are sacred fig tree, Bodhi Tree, Yggdrasil in Norse mythology, Thor’s Oak, etc.

The places where Axis Mundi is present are considered to be ‘Omphalos’ or navel in Greek. From centuries men have come in contact with these cosmic poles and have been able to transport to a different realm only to come back with more knowledge. And in modern times, Axis Mundi forms a part of architecture as well like Washington monument, Eiffel Tower, Peace Pagodas etc. With multiple interpretations and acceptance in various cultures, the subject remains of great interest to those seeking deeper understanding of other realms.

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Photograph by Igor Ballyhoo

Axis Mundi

Non-being, Nothingness, and the Power of the Nexus

Life

Gary Z McGee

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October 27, 2015

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Non-being, Nothingness, and the Power of the Nexus

“Thirty spokes share the wheel’s hub;
It is the center hole that makes it useful.
Shape clay into a vessel;
It is the space within that makes it useful.
Cut doors and windows for a room;
It is the holes which make it useful.
Therefore profit comes from what is there;
Usefulness from what is not there.” ~ Lao Tzu

Between inner and outer there is the center: a pulsing void of glorious nothingness just waiting to become something. Between non-being and being there is becoming. There is a vibrating nexus of potentiality within this becoming, from what has been created to what has yet to be created.

This primordial center, this embryonic becoming, this nascent nexus, is a sacred link between worlds. And those who can tap into its power, are obtaining the key to aligning worlds.

The Mystery of Madness

“Be silent and listen: have you recognized your madness and do you admit it? Have you noticed that all your foundations are completely mired in madness? Do you not want to recognize your madness and welcome it in a friendly manner? You wanted to accept everything. So accept madness too. Let the light of your madness shine, and it will suddenly dawn on you. Madness is not to be despised and not to be feared, but instead you should give it life…If you want to find paths, you should also not spurn madness, since it makes up such a great part of your nature…Be glad that you can recognize it, for you will thus avoid becoming its victim. Madness is a special form of the spirit and clings to all teachings and philosophies, but even more to daily life, since life itself is full of craziness and at bottom utterly illogical. Man strives toward reason only so that he can make rules for himself. Life itself has no rules. That is its mystery and its unknown law. What you call knowledge is an attempt to impose something comprehensible on life.” ~ C.G. Jung, The Red Book

Life is incomprehensible when you stop to think about it. Our desire to make it comprehensible is honorable, but it can also be limiting. Sometimes rolling with the incomprehensible is the wiser course.

Sometimes staring into the abyss and daring the abyss to stare back, is strategically sound when seeking things beyond our current understanding. Sometimes we must subsume madness and desire, through imaginative insurgence, if we are to balance the forces between worlds.

Sometimes, as Clive Barker said, “you just have to trust your own madness.”

When seeking a sacred connection with the Great Mystery, with the mighty nexus, freedom relies upon the efficacy of madness. Madness liberates us from common structure. It melts away preconceived divisions between inner and outer, lower and greater, finite and infinite.

We’re free to slip into foolishness, to double-dog-dare the universe to bring order back into our downward spiral into folly. Seekers of authentic individuation, I beseech you, take “sanity” in moderation and adventure will not elude you. You will discover an adventure unexpected in common hours.

Like Albert Camus suggested, “Always go too far, because that’s where you’ll find the truth.”

Strategic madness proposes a principle of interruption. Certainty is put on notice. Forgone conclusions are disconnected from preconceived notions. Passion, hunger, and appetite are sustained in the face of the quotidian. We learn how to die. We unlearn how to be a slave to time.

As Ahab said in Moby Dick, “What I’ve dared I’ve willed, and what I’ve willed I’ll do. They think me mad. But I am demoniac, I am madness maddened. That wild madness that’s only calm to comprehend itself.”

Indeed. Strategic madness frees us to tap the cornerstone despite the philosopher’s stone, to turn the keystone despite the key-masters, to shake the secure foundations of the human condition despite our condition.

The Secret of Silence

“There is a voice that doesn’t use words. Listen.” ~ Rumi

Solitude is extremely underrated in our time. This is likely because the majority of us are afraid of what silence has to teach us. Fear keeps us married to the hustle and bustle of hyper-reality.

As long as there’s noise, distraction, and common commotion we feel “safe.” As long as we’re in a hurry, rushing through the day, and constantly on the go, we’re less likely to have to confront the things that really matter, or face the demons that keep us fearful.

Like Carl Jung articulated, “People will do anything, no matter how absurd, in order to avoid facing their own souls. One does not become enlightened by imagining figures of light, but by making the darkness conscious.”

Out there in the wild and secluded places, away from the clanking steel of civility, far from the jackhammer of productivity-at-all-costs, clear of the blaring horns and blurring speed, there is a conversation going on between silence and stillness. These two powerful allies are whispering to each other the secrets of the universe using a language older than words.

This language is sacred food for starving minds; liquid ambrosia for parched souls. They are teaching each other the Middle Way. They are philosophizing over what comes between finitude and infinity, between non-being and being.

And for those who can listen, I mean really listen –with their darkness conscious like a deer in headlights and their fearless light shining into the deepest dark– what has not yet been discovered is being discussed. What has not yet been written is being written back and forth on secret sticky notes that defy time.

The Nexus, the in-between, the sacred crossroad is being pulverized into a billion bridges connecting all things, just waiting for us to cross them. We need only listen with our souls, with soulful intent, to penetrate the deep conversation between silence and stillness.

Like Eckhart Tolle said, “Be the silent watcher of your thoughts and behavior. You are beneath the thinker. You are the stillness beneath the mental noise. You are the love and joy beneath the pain.”

Being in Non-being

“This human capacity to become a nexus of the inner and outer, of non-being and being, of what is written and what is not yet written, is key to aligning the worlds and keeping life in balance. Life was meant to function not as just the outer plane of reality, but as a multidimensional, interrelating reality. And there need to be those who know this secret.” ~ Llewellyn Vaughan-Lee

With one foot in nothingness and the other in infinity, with one ear tuned to silence and the other to stillness, we become sentinel, guardian, and periphery keeper. We gradually become more prepared for paradox, for when worlds collide together to reveal the nakedness of the Great Mystery. And have no doubt, the Great Mystery is gloriously naked.

Non-being, like no-mind, is an in-between state experienced by a being capable of balancing madness with genius, silence with the “voices in the head,” and stillness with the movement of all things.

It’s a divine navigation of nothingness, a dive into the void, coming up for nothing but for air: sacred oxygen, soul-breath. It’s learning how to die and unlearning how to be a slave all at once. It’s being so in tune with the nexus that one becomes the nexus.

In the desert of the void, amidst the dreamscape of uncreated emptiness, beneath the hidden face of God, the mighty Nexus is the glue that binds all things, the link that bridges the gap between nothing and something, the essence of non-being. Within Non-being, there is tremendous freedom because there are no limitations.

Because just as the Unbounded is, the Unbounded is not. Just as Non-being is, Non-being is not. There will always be a nothingness within even the most real absolute. There will always be something within even the most unreal emptiness.

When we become the Nexus we gain the power to tap into this sacred state, to work within the void, to channel the energies of Absolute Truth from the vacuum of absolute nothingness, to pull the voice box of God out of the throat of the universe and blow into it like a bullhorn.

And Rumi said: “No more words. In the name of this place we drink in our breathing, stay quiet like a flower. So the nightbirds will start singing.”

Image source:

Solitude | Rumi quote

Four Ways the Counterintuitive Approach May be the Better Approach

Life
Wisdom

Gary Z McGee

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October 24, 2015

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Four Ways the Counterintuitive Approach May be the Better Approach

“Believe me. The secret of reaping the greatest fruitfulness and the greatest enjoyment from life is to live dangerously.” ~ Friedrich Nietzsche

On the one hand, we all know that if we continue doing things the same way, we’re going to continue to get the same result. On the other hand, we are so accustomed to doing things a certain way it seems like too much of a chore to try something different.

But this general disposition effects our lives more profoundly than we might think. Sometimes it can be as simple as taking a step back and thinking to ourselves, “What if I try the opposite of what I usually do? What if, instead of living comfortably, I decided to live dangerously? Would I reap greater fruit and greater enjoyment out of life?”

Perhaps. But let’s not get too far ahead of ourselves. Let’s begin with things that have a direct effect on our general disposition toward life and our perception of reality.

Here are four ways in which the counterintuitive approach may be the better approach.

1) Don’t be certain, be skeptical

“That which can be destroyed by the truth should be.” ~ P.C. Hodgell

Walk into any library, into any Barnes & Noble. The books on the shelves represent some of the greatest minds of human thought. When you open one, suddenly you’re standing on the shoulder of a giant. Every single book will give you a unique perspective on life, but, and here’s the rub, every single book was written by a human being.

And every single human since the dawn of mankind has been a fundamentally flawed, fallible, and imperfect being. This should go without saying, but it absolutely must be said, because people tend to be in denial about it. Not only in regards to their own fallibility but in regards to the giants who came before them, beaming like shiny beacons from golden bookshelves.

I’m not saying you shouldn’t stand on the shoulders of giants. Not at all. That’s one of my favorite pastimes. I’m saying be skeptical when you do. Written thoughts do not necessarily imply wise thoughts. Nor do wise thoughts necessarily imply Truth.

Whether it’s a holy book written 2,000 years ago by a bunch of Middle Eastern men who believed they had all the answers, or a scientific paper written by a patent clerk who thought he discovered the answer to the mysteries of energy and gravity, or anything between, be skeptical.

Stand on the shoulders of giants, just don’t put all your eggs in their basket. Take it into consideration in order to expand upon what you’ve seen. Certainty is for amateurs. Skepticism is for masters.

Remember: when standing on the shoulders of giants, seek not certainty, even if the giant is certain. Seek uncertainty instead, even if doing so threatens to shatter the fragility of your faith. When a giant is established or resting in peace, their shoulders can be comforting, there can be no doubt. But that is not what a giants shoulder is for.

Like Ursula K. Le Guin said, “The only thing that makes life possible is permanent, intolerable uncertainty; not knowing what comes next.”

2) Don’t be invulnerable, be vulnerable

“Experience is the hardest teacher. It gives you the test first and the lesson afterward.” ~ Oscar Wilde

Invulnerability is overrated. Weaponized hyper-security is overvalued. Manic comfort at the expense of comfort-zone-expanding adventures is valued to highly.

Like Mary Oliver wisely put, “Your heart is beating, isn’t it? You’re not in chains, are you? There is nothing more pathetic than caution when headlong might save a life, even, possibly, your own.”

Within the violent, militarized societies of today, it’s difficult to feel our way through the metallic armor that has been cast over us like a security blanket. But feel through it we must, if we wish to get back to the Desert of the Real and back to the wisdom of the source.

This means getting vulnerable even when others have all their walls up. This means getting vulnerable despite the invulnerable tank of the state. This means standing in front of that tank and staring it down with Tiananmen-like courage and naked bravery.

This means having tough skin and a soft heart. This means staring into the abyss of the human condition and having enough humor to laugh at all the daunting demons.

Truly being vulnerable means being okay with getting tested first and learning the lesson afterward. It’s putting ourselves out there, raw but resolute with an insurmountable courage. It’s taking a leap of courage.

It’s living dangerously rather than comfortably or safely. It’s walking up to that very same abyss and doing as Friedrich Nietzsche advised: “Throw roses into the abyss and say: ‘Here is my thanks to the monster who didn’t succeed in swallowing me alive.’”

3) Don’t overthink, overflow

“There is a tide in the affairs of men, which taken at the flood, leads on to fortune. Omitted, all the voyage of their life is bound in shallows and in miseries. On such a full sea are we now afloat. And we must take the current when it serves, or lose our ventures.” ~ William Shakespeare

The age of information is upon us. The internet is an overwhelming ocean of interconnected thoughts. We are all lost in a sea of uncertain knowledge acting like it’s certain, awash with crushing waves of opinion and tsunamis of data.

But alas, wisdom eludes the majority of us. This is because, within the realm of thought, the majority of us have forgotten the two most important steps of wisdom: The first step is to question everything; the second step is to question the answers.

But it goes even deeper than this. We are overthinking in the first place. We are unable to let go, to breathe, to simply fall into the masterpiece. We too often have the cart of Thought in front of the horse of Flow. We’re a Jackson minus the Pollock, frozen over the pale-white canvas of our life.

Twiddling our thumbs. Afraid to make a mark without thinking it through. Don’t be afraid. Don’t overthink, overflow. Let go. Dive headfirst into your art, whatever it is. Just remember to breathe.

Creativity is in communication with creativity. There’s a universe of creativity in which we are merely specks. But the creative urge within us remembers its connection with the universe. Even the tiniest speck has some degree of creativity in its link to the universe, which is unfathomable. But the way we fathom it is to be it.

To become the artistic process itself. To overflow. To allow the deep, aching chasm that is the emptied cup of our mind to be filled, not with thought, but with flow.

Like Elizabeth Gilbert said, “The only thing that can fill an eternal hole is the eternal.”

Let it go. Then let it in. Just remember to breathe.

4) Don’t cling to Love, let Love go

“Drop the idea that attachment and love is one thing. They are enemies. It is attachment that destroys all love. If you feed and nourish attachment, love will be destroyed; if you feed and nourish love, attachment will fall away by itself. They are not one; they are two separate entities, and antagonistic to each other.” ~ Osho

Here’s the thing: everybody wants to be loved, and everybody wants to fall in love. Whether it’s with a person, with life, or with the moment. But here’s the other thing: everything changes. There is no permanence.

People change, fall in and out of love, and die. Life changes, takes us through thick and thin, and then it ends. Each moment bleeds into a new moment and is lost forever. Even our memories are inexact and short-lived.

And yet, this is all the more reason to love. It’s because things end, that we cherish it while we can. It’s because the moment passes, that we appreciate it while we’re in it. It’s because love doesn’t last, that we love at all.

Like Osho said, “Love is not about possession. Love is about appreciation.”

Love is Time’s ultimate benchmark. When we let love go, we’re allowing love to be free. We’re allowing it to go through the process of itself. When we let love go, we’re honoring the universe its vicissitudes.

When we let love go, we’re breathing in and out. We’re more in love with the coming and going of love than we are with it either coming or going, stopping or starting, living or dying. When we let love go, we are practicing Buddhist non-attachment par excellence. We are Zenning. We are emptying our cup of appreciation so it can be filled over and over again.

Understand: when we let love go we are not letting go of Love itself – not at all. We are letting go of the ego’s need to possess love. We are letting go of the ego’s attachment to love: the need to cling, to smother, or even trap it. It’s not like we let go of love and then forget about it.

No, it’s more like we are honoring the love we had by allowing it to be free. Love is never abandoned, nor is it ever forgotten. Only the needy, codependent, addictive, ego-driven side of love – filled with unhealthy expectations and preprogrammed cultural dispositions about the way love should be, is abandoned.

Indeed. True love, infinite love, enlightened love, is the uncommon ability to let love go.

Image source

Black bulb
Galaxy in a bulb
Water bulb

3 Ways to Feel Creative and Inspired Every Day

Ester Eckhaus

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October 23, 2015

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3 Ways to Feel Creative and Inspired Every Day

“When a poet digs himself into a hole, he doesn’t climb out. He digs deeper, enjoys the scenery, and comes out the other side enlightened.” ~ Criss Jami, Venus in Arms

Stuck creativity can feel like suffocating or drowning to any artist. Even when there is no deadline to create by, one can often go days or weeks feeling creatively stagnant. It can eat away at you.

Even while having a good or successful day there will be an itch to create and a nagging at the back of your mind saying, “yes, but I haven’t created anything today.” If you’re anything like me, you know how horrible it can be if this goes on for too long. Whether your projects are standing half-done, or your mind is just uninspired and procrastinating, here are a few tips to get your creative sparks firing.

“Morning Pages”

This is the most valuable thing I learnt in art school. Morning Pages is a concept taken from the book “The Artist’s Way,” by Julia Cameron. What you do is: take 10-15 minutes in the morning, three pages of a notebook, and just write. This should not be a journal or a diary, it’s a free-form stream of consciousness that is free to explore anything that might be going through your mind; whether it’s your worries, musings, to-do list for the day, etc. There are no rules or “right way” to do morning pages. It should just be three pages of unedited, uninhibited, unapologizing you, and your thoughts.

The Two Things Morning Pages accomplishes:

1) You are emptying your mind of all the possible distracting thoughts of the day. These are all the thoughts that will otherwise nag and nudge at you while you may be trying to work, create, or just be. By giving all these thoughts the time and space to be acknowledged and expressed, you are opening your mind and attention for other things.

2) Morning pages are a good way to brainstorm or process. When I feel stuck (in any way, whether it be creative, emotional, or mental) I will pick up my notebook and use this free-form writing to explore my mind on any subject that may be keeping me stagnant.

It is just structured enough, and just free enough, to unstick my brain. Because your pen is following the complicated process of your brain, and putting it out in front of you, things tend to become clear where there was brain fog before. I will sometimes find amazing solutions to stubborn problems, or questions, in this way.

Don’t worry if it feels forced or unnatural at the beginning. Just write the three pages, whether your thoughts come out profound or simple, and you can even throw the pages out afterwards if you wish. The pages are just for you and will start to feel more natural and helpful if you stick to it for awhile.

Also note, that although it’s called morning pages, and it is indeed most helpful to do this at the start of your day, I have made a habit of doing it at any time of the day. At the beginning, the best way to get into the habit is to stick to the morning, but once you’ve got it, make it your own and form it to whatever you need it to be for your unique creative process.

Learn something new

“Dive again and again into the river of uncertainty. Create in the dark, only then can you recognize the light.” ~ Jyrki Vainonen

Another way to get yourself unstuck and moving is to give your brain something new to eat. This can be in any form. If you’re feeling uninspired as a writer, read some new poetry, or read those articles you saved in your tabs but never got around to.

A painter can find newfound inspiration by seeing an art form that has never been explored before, and a teacher can be reinvigorated by watching an online video about new educational methods.

So, whether you’re trying to finish up that essay but can’t think of any original ideas, or if your brain just feels like it’s been sleeping on the job lately, a good way to jostle things is to do anything that will feed you new and interesting information and ideas.

Good ideas often lead to newer ideas and insights. So, go to a lecture or an art opening, buy a new book, listen to a new album, read an out-of-the-box article, or spend time around friends who bring up interesting topics, and see where new ideas can bring you.

Practice being a channel

“The role of the artist is to ask questions, not answer them.” ~ Anton Chekhov

Any artist will tell you that the best ideas and work come from a place completely outside of them, and at a time that they least expect it. Some people even say that you have no control over your creativity; it comes and goes in waves, and you just have to be there, ready with your pencil or paint, to ride with it.

Here are two things that are helpful to ride the waves:

1) Acknowledge that you are just a channel for this creativity you experience.
2) Create a space for the creativity to find you.

This is done by finding a spot that makes you feel happy and inspired (or even just a place you feel you can concentrate). For me, it’s always my bed, or in a cozy room with lots of sunlight. For other people, it’s in nature, or in closed dark spaces.

Wherever it is, find it, and plant yourself there. Next is the acknowledging part. However you feel comfortable, put the message out into the universe that you are a ready channel to receive your work. You can say it out loud, just think about it, or even write about it (morning pages anyone?).

Being a channel is difficult. It requires you to let go of your ego and control over your creativity, and be grateful to something outside of yourself when you do receive it.

For some people, this is a hard thing to let go of, especially because creativity is so personal. But for others it is relieving and refreshing when they can feel that they were given these gifts for a purpose and there is something guiding them.

If all else fails, take a walk, spend some time with yourself, or someone you enjoy, and do something fun. Come back to the creative endeavor later when you’ve had some time away, and hopefully you will be able to see it with new eyes.

Your elusive creative genius | Elizabeth Gilbert