The Decision to have a creative life.

One day, not yesterday and not last week but years ago  I decided to have a creative life.

Having a creative life right now is mostly expressed as writing--but it's not just that. It's the way I live. Sometimes my creativity is expressed as writing or drawing or painting or gardening or conducting some odd experiment but it's a thread that goes through my day to day living. Because of that thread, I write nearly every day--this wasn't always the case.

When I was a young adult I was really prolific--I turned out short stories and artwork with frightening ease. And then when I was flushed into the working world it all stopped. I just couldn't get back in my groove. So I started to tell myself ridiculous stories about all the things I had before that "made me creative". I tried to simulate those things and blamed my lack of creative fire on my job, my relationship, obligations etc. I blamed it on living in a two-bedroom apartment with no "space" to write in. I blamed it on being in a relationship with a highly extroverted person who loved being social (and taking me with her). I blamed it on everything except my failure to sit down and put pen to paper.

Instead of writing I spent my time thinking about what I didn't like doing, about how to escape the things I didn't like, and about how my life would be so much better once I finally escaped every irritation. Because then, once I wasn't irritated, I could finally have a creative life.

I played make believe that my creative life would happen in a future time when things were magically better.

My life felt like it was perpetually on hold.

I finally realized things wouldn't get better unless I sat down and wrote.

The space I wanted to have to create I had to create inside myself--the will to create no matter what my circumstances.

The will to create doesn't require me having a nice studio, perfect quiet, comfort or other rarified qualities. It meant making my creative life the Beloved. It meant taking the mundane and elevating it. Finding magic in everyday somethings. 

Today I'm focused on telling deeper truths.

It all started with the decision to have a creative life and believing in the perfection of right now.

Are you waiting for things to change so things will change for you or will you be the one to change first? How will you begin your own creative life?