Flex The Creative Muscle

Creating is part of my life.  The forms it takes vary in that they go through phases.

When I was younger, I had an active imagination.  The future was mine and I envisioned it with bright colors.  I built forts, played games, and did a lot of pretending. 

As I aged, my creativity took a more “written” form.  I drafted Tall Tales and tried my hand at poetry. 

For high school graduation – I actually composed a song with a friend with whom I had attended every grade since kindergarten (the words hang on my wall).  It was my one and only serious attempt at lyrics.  Now I create fun songs with my daughter about her, her dog, our pets, or whatever crosses our minds at the time.  We play with words and music as though they are a kind of game with everyone laughing throughout. 

In college I put pen to paper to create an animated bicycle for a friend who loved to ride.

While living abroad, creativity came out in teaching English and writing letters.

And then there was graduate school, my imagination found the computer and created a lovely story about two Phoenix… the likes of which has been eternally lost.  That as the last story I wrote – it is the one story that I would love to have for my daughter as it was written for her dad.  It is a loss I grieve (that neither he or I have a copy for her).  Beyond two short, poem stories for her, I have not written a story since.  That muse doesn’t strike often I have learned.  The stories I have written seem to write themselves – gifts from my heart for another.

When she was born I found the creativity in parenting.

Followed by a love for digital photography – which left me playing with pictures and lay-outs (which I need to return to at some point as last year was a wash on that front)

And now, I am writing again.

Nonfiction more than anything else.  A fanciful poem here and there.  I am writing and creating in so many ways – and it feels good.

And I accept writing challenges when I can find them … Like writing for The Sun Magazine!  (The current challenge is “Office.”  Please, what do I find to write about my office???)

Some create for their livelihood, others create with the desire to be famous.  I create as it is part of who I am, to not create in one way or another would be… impossible I believe.  Even if I found myself without tools or materials, I would be creating and imagining in my mind.  I write because I have no choice; writing and creating are aspects of the person that I am.  I create for the same reason – I am not sure that I could live a life that didn’t involve creativity.

My mom says that she isn’t a creative person – yet she works with her hands and fabrics and yarns. 

My dad claims creative is not in him – yet he builds and organizes and makes things. 

My daughter’s other grandmother claims she isn’t creative – yet she paints, creates with stained glass and cooks…

My daughter’s dad would have one believe that he is all law and numbers – undermining the artistic work that he does with foods, pencils, and pottery. 

Sometimes I think that we attempt to define creativity as painting, singing, theater, writing – the biggies in the “art” world.  We attempt to say that we aren’t “creative” as society might expect more from us or a greater level of talent than we can achieve or than we feel we possess. 

I have yet to meet a person that isn’t creative.  It is all a matter of unpeeling the onion, pushing the envelope, and opening the mind.  Creativity takes so many forms.  Each form is something to celebrate!  (My office is a celebration of creativity from the artwork of a loved child on my bulletin boards to a sketch from a student on my wall to paintings from a former teacher to a photograph I took in Moscow years ago… not to mention all the creativity I observe on my computer and create with the keyboard!)

Celebrate your creativity here and now – Share!!

And feel free to take a few minutes and write about your office in the comments or for the Sun link above