Being Creative On Purpose
Did you know that you can turn on your creativity on purpose whenever you need to? With a little practice, you can decide to be creative and make it happen when you need it to happen.
Here is how you can do it:
Decide what it is that you need to create, or identify the problem you need to solve. Take time to put it down on paper (or a computer screen) Allot a reasonable amount of time thinking about it and noodling on paper (15 minutes to a couple of hours) depending on the complexity of the project. Gather the material and tools needed to make a first draft, prototype, proof-of-concept, etc. Make the first one understanding that there is a 95% chance you will throw it away. Evaluate the first one honestly and make changes. Make the second one – be prepared to discard this one also. Make more changes hopefully more subtle and refined this time. Still won’t be perfect, but much closer to useable. Put it down for a while (an hour or two to a week or two) and think about what you have learned. Re-examine what you made asking how you can make it better or what different tools or techniques will be easier, faster, simpler than before. By this time you should be ready to make some keepers.
This works with pens, bowls, hollow forms, spinning tops with texture, hybrid resin castings, painted projects, turned lidded boxes, scoops and ladles, candle sticks, bottle stoppers, pepper mills and just about anything else you can think of.
What I have just shared with you is the exact process I use to design my original jigs, fixtures, tools and many of the items you see on my website. Sometimes the product is completely original, but more often it is my version of something which already exists but which incorporates my improvements to make it more useful. I’m not naturally that creative, but I have learned that if I follow the steps above, at some point, the creativity takes over and everything seems to come together when I need it to. An old friend once reminded me that :
“Opportunity is so often overlooked because it is usually disguised as hard work.”
If you follow my advice, you will never again have to say or think that you are not creative. You can be creative on purpose. Remember that wherever you go, there you are.
Here is my inspiration for this week’s message:
Exodus 36:1 MSG "Bezalel and Oholiab, along with everyone whom God has given the skill and know-how for making everything involved in the worship of the Sanctuary as commanded by God, are to start to work."
Jeremiah 18:4 MSG Whenever the pot the potter was working on turned out badly, as sometimes happens when you are working with clay, the potter would simply start over and use the same clay to make another pot.
Galatians 6:9 MSG So let's not allow ourselves to get fatigued doing good. At the right time we will harvest a good crop if we don't give up, or quit.
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