Last week, while I was struggling with technology associated to blogging, I started thinking about how these hiccups thwarted my blogging and my fiction writing. Then, I took stock of the other important things that I often let get in the way of what I need to get done: stacks of laundry, meals to prepare, must-read books gathering dust, socializing, and vacuuming the car for the first time since the millennium. A vicious cycle, to be sure.
Sometimes life interferes with creativity and sometimes we let life interfere with our creativity. How do you keep the balance?
To keep interferences at a minimum, some creative folks rely on a set rhythm for their creativity. Each Friday morning is set aside for a creative pursuit.
For me, often my interferences are not my own and come in the sizes and shapes of a 2-, 5-, or 8-year-old.
But last week involved letting go of some projects until I had time to re-group. At other times, it might be shifting your bedtime by 15 minutes. Often 15 or 30 minutes in the early morning easily corresponds to an hour during other times of my day when the phone is ringing, the kids are running around and the e-mail is at its furious mid-day pace. I tried that on a couple days last week, but I was fighting a cold and fought me every step of the way to get less sleep.
Just as with other personal choices, you need to do what feels right for you. For me, I just had to let go of last week’s technology frustrations and try to focus on something else, until I knew I had time to focus on fixing my problems. Folding laundry and the vacuum rose above my need to figure out the characteristics of a fictional protagonist.
And, after all is done and without the demanding distractions, the creativity has become easier to reach.

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