Eric Maisel - Everyday Creative: 30 Way to Wake Up Your Inner Artist

I've been working as a therapist and a creativity coach for the past twenty years with clients all around the world. Some are world-famous writers, musicians, painters, actors, screenwriters, and directors. One thing I've learned is that less is more in therapy and in coaching. A simple idea or solution, once it takes hold, is more valuable than long discussions and arcane theories. One nugget is better than tons of ore.

Each card in the A Little Every Day Deck series presents a single idea and a simple exercise to try. I believe that each card's lesson is an important one and that trying even one exercise can change your life. You can use the decks in one or all of the following ways. You can read through the thirty cards in your deck, pick out one that feels particularly resonant, and try the simple exercise the card suggests. You can use the cards as a thirty-day program, taking in one message a day and on some days (or on all days) stretching yourself by trying the accompanying exercise. You can shuffle the cards, cut the deck, and let a random (Is it really random?) message speak directly to you. These are just a few suggestions. I'm sure that you'll find your own, additional ways to use these decks.

First published in 2004 by

Red Wheel/Weiser, LLC

York Beach, ME

With offices at:

368 Congress Street

Boston, MA 02210

www.redwheelweiser.com

Copyright 2004 Eric Maisel

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from Red Wheel/Weiser, LLC. Reviewers may quote brief passages.

ISBN 1-59003-077-X

Typeset in ITC Garamond Condensed and Bureau Grotesque Three Seven by David A. Freedman

Printed in Hong Kong

Asia Pacific

11 10 09 08 07 06 05 04

8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

The six decks in the A Little Every Day series are Everyday Calm, Everyday Creative, Everyday Smart, and the soon to come Everyday Mindful, Everyday Centered, and Everyday Joyful. These six ideascalm, creative, smart, mindful, centered, and joyfulmake up a complete program for creating an excellent way of life. Each individual idea supports the other five. If you use the decks in concert with one another, you will find yourself growing in profound, unexpected ways.

The thirty cards in the Everyday Creative deck provide you with thirty different ways to wake up your inner artist. They help you undertake new creative projects, live your life more authentically, and manifest your true artistic nature. I invite you to acquire confidence, allow for fortunate accidents, embrace mystery, reduce limiting anxiety, and much more. Each card in the Everyday Creative deck will help you grow more creativejust shuffle and cut!

I am always happy to hear from readers of my books and users of my decks. You can find the best way to contact me at my web-site, www.ericmaisel.com. I hope that you find the decks in the A Little Every Day series evocative, beautiful, and useful. May you have a calm, creative, smart, mindful, centered, joyful day!

Creativity flows from relationship. It flows from the relationship you forge with yourself. You are the teacher and you are the student.

Grow creative by fostering self-relationship.

Start a journal you call My Creative Solutions. Every time a problem or issue arises, turn to your journal and ask yourself, What do I already know that will help me solve this? Begin to see yourself as your own best resource.

Be everyday creative. Embrace creative work. Manifest the qualities of an artist.

Grow creative by manifesting your artist's nature.

Name some creative project that you would like to tackle. Then write down the qualities in you that will help bring this project to fruition qualities like imagination, spunk, discipline, a sense of humor. These qualities make up your artist's nature.

Stay close to your creative work. Creativity requires intimacy. Distance causes forgetfulness and pain.

Grow creative through intimate connection.

If you are a writer, always carry your writing pad. If you are a painter, always carry your sketch pad. If you haven't settled on a discipline or project, carry a notebook in which you jot down thoughts about how you might work creatively.

Mystery is the artist's territory. We know. Anwe don't know.

Grow creative by embracing mystery.

What do you find really mysterious? In that direction lies the potential for excellent work. Make a list you call Mysteries and then read it over. Circle the mysteries that stir your soul and repeat each one out loud, like an incantation.

Silence provokes deep responses. Quiet your mind. Then beauty will rise up in you.

Grow creative through genuine silence.

Pick a quiet hour of the day. Turn off the television, close your book, eliminate all stimuli. Quiet your mind by saying Hush! Let silence reign. When you are fully quiet, say to yourself, Come, creative work! Pursue what arrives.

Astonish yourself. Then you will astonish others. What is most astonishing inyour heart is truest.

Grow creative by astonishing yourself.

What would astonish you? To write a novel in six weeks' time? To start a wildly successful business in your home? To draw beautifully? Name something whose accomplishment would astonish youand then astonish yourself.

Concentrate, but also surrender. Surrender, but also concentrate. Sometimes one first, sometimes the other, always both.

Grow creative through concentration and surrender.

Find a brain teaser, puzzle, or conundrum. Concentrate very hard for five minutes on solving it. Then let it go completely. Experience total surrender to not knowing. Repeat this process three or four times.

Learn by doing. There is no other way. Experience is the best teacher.

Grow creative through simple effort.

Select a creative project. Prepare and commit to a creative work schedule. Work on your project for a month without second-guessing your choice or bad-mouthing your progress.

Art happens on dull days too. Do not wait for inspiration. Do not wait for anything.

Grow creative by regularly and routinely creating.

Make the following pledge: I will do some creative work every day, if only for fifteen or twenty minutes. Honor your pledge for the next two weeks and spend fourteen consecutive days creating.

Unexplored territory has no maps. You will have to go into the unknown. Guided only by your inner compass.

Grow creative through endless exploration.

Pick a subject that fascinates you, one that you've always wanted to study. Avoid saying It's too late to start or There's too much to learn. Enter the unexplored territory of your new subject like an intrepid explorer.