Sharika Roland

I have some friends that are in a place where it seems impossible to get started. Being creative seems a far away dream and for someone else.

The reality is creativity is not some weird visit from another planet. It is only a habit. If you can get dressed every morning and take out the garbage and get the mail you can be creative. A habit is just something you always do without thinking. Everybody knows that but what they might not know is habits are totally made up by us for survival. You do what you have to do.

I am a painter so I have to get new ideas every single day. If you don’t have to do it , you won’t. What makes you take the first step is to make some kind of agreement with someone else in the world that you will do it. If it is only you who knows about your desire, you won’t do it.  You will be too tired at the end of every day.

Tell one other person I am going to write one paragraph every day till I have a chapter or some other small step. I guarantee once you start the energy will come and you will feel better about everything you do. You will be set free.
If an idea is going through your head, it is not there by accident. Someone is going to need to see what you are about to create. You owe it to them to do it. It is your job in this life. Everybody does not get the same ideas. I think your creative urges are direct from God and you better do them. It is not a luxury.

image by chrysaora

The truth is if you scribble for three hours straight and just enjoy the scribble and just keep doing it for three hours, somewhere in there will be a beautiful line. a beautiful thought or a beautiful dream. The act of writing down thoughts { Julia Cameron recommends three pages a day to get things going} but I have found that three hours is the magic number to totally leave yourself behind and go ahead. After 20 minutes it becomes boring but after you have gone three hours you are in a different place. I discovered this once when I was locked in a car for three hours. I had a notebook and pen so I started writing down anything that was amusing. After so much time passed the things I was drawing were so much better and my thoughts were so clear. Three hours are going to pass anyway so why not use them to get to a fantastic place.

I have brothers that possess kill. You give them a project and they will go to the edge of infinity to get it done. My brother Andy has asthma and has only the use of a smalll portion of his lungs, like 20 percent. Needless to say he climbed Mt. Rainier to the top the first time. The guide that was with him said”Who is this guy?” He was going up so fast he thought he must have done this before. He didn’t even know he had almost no breath to get him to the top.
Another brother, Tim has done similar things with his restaurant . He built the restaurant and is the only chef and sometimes he serves 100 people at a time. He moves like lightening.
Andy and Tim both have a kill factor of 100. My Dad was like this too. In fact everybody in my family has it, except me. I only maintain kill for about a couple of hours and then quit- unless I have people around me. If I have my family around me I can do it a little longer.
Long story short the Kill factor is good. The Kill factor will push you when you cannot go any more

photo by informatique

Things can go slow when trying to birth a new idea. The problem with art shows is you have to come up with a new idea that is fresh but not too fresh and to too much like you did before. This morning has been a few hours of whiting out what I have been working on for a week. I do not like it enough; I have to white it out. It is time to let it sit and stew for awhile. Every year I swear that I am going to have the show done before January and here it is Christmas almost, and I have nothing good. I have a name but that is all. I am trying every trick in the book to get something going and it is still not working. So I am going to do nothing for awhile and stew a bit and find my air. Air is what I call being able to have flow where I am not aware of myself. I am not in any air yet so I will look for some. Maybe some fresh air outside will help.

photo by slworking2

People often say they cant draw a stick man to show how uncreative they are. I always think good. You probably are thinking drawing realistically has something to do with creativity. Well it doesn’t. In fact I would say that drawing in a distorted way is wonderful and inspiring. The only thing you have to do different is to not get all stressed out when things go different than what you are looking at. We are all unique and I think we should enjoy that fact. NObody will ever draw just the way you do and that is your gift to everyone else. Egon Scheil is a good example of that. He did a new thing. We should all do new things that only we can do. I wish I had a group of people that were not artists and had them do a show.I think they would be amazed how wonderful it would be and they certainly would change their minds about how creative they are.

art by Denise Carbonell