I'm happily writing away, musing on how I want my day to go, pondering all that I'm grateful for and BOOM, Lizzo's here.
She tells me it's bad b*tch o'clock, it's thick-thirty. How she's been through a lot, but she's still feeling rather flirty. OK?
Her arrival is a clear invitation to put down my pen and practise the vocals for my imaginary audition for Pop Idol.
But now is not the time, Lizzo.
You see, for my morning pages, I follow a method of continuously writing.
I let my thoughts land on the page completely unfiltered without worrying about what comes out.
It's where I shake off whatever mood I happen to have woken up in and flex my creative muscles so they're nice and warmed up for whatever task I have to complete next, like this article for example.
And if my pen stops moving, it's a clear sign I'm getting caught up in the end product instead of prioritising the process, which is not the point of the exercise.
So the answer's no, my dear beloved. I know you want me to stop and turn up the music, but I am committed to my craft. Maybe next time?
I turn back to my pages and I kid you not, I can't stop bloody writing "It's about damn time" on repeat.
*sigh*
Mhm, OK Lizzo. You win.
You see, what's happened is that even though I'm trying my best to ignore her, the lyrics have slipped their way into my thoughts and without meaning to, I've let Lizzo hi-jack my own self-expression.
In this instance, it's obviously because I'm trying to write whilst also playing music with lyrics a.k.a A bad idea.
But in the era of constant content consumption that we live in, I suspect this creative takeover happens a lot more than we realise.
When we innocently scroll trying to deal with the sticky feelings or resistance to creative work... we're actually taking on other peoples' ideas. We're absorbing THEIR words, THEIR atyle and THEIR way of expressing themselves.
And then when we go to create our own stuff? We have nothing original to contribute.
Our brains are so full of everyone else's thoughts, that there's zero room for our own ideas to grow.
But what I usually see happen as a result of this, is that when we feel uninspired, we end up spending more time online in search of inspiration, not less.
We scroll and scroll in the hopes that something will spark a moment of Genius and yet, the opposite is usually true.
The more of other people's content we consume, the less likely we are able to authentically express ourselves.
Just imagine your brain as a kitchen sponge. If you soaked up a load of tea with that thing, you wouldn't expect to be squeezing out orange juice in the sink, would you?
I've always found the same to be true with creative endeavours.
What you feed your brain determines what your brain will produce.
And a diet of other people's processed thoughts isn't a good fuel for your own originality.
That's why content consumption detoxes are vital to staying creatively free.
The next time you're stuck without inspiration, don't turn to your phone.
Seek out something else that gets those creative juices flowing. (Walks, yoga and anything where I micro-sweat is usually my go-to.)
And if that fails?
You can try the 'continuous writing' technique to get those creative wheels turning, where you just let your pen flow on the page without stopping, even if/especially when what you're writing makes zero sense.
The point is simply to clear your head, observe your own thoughts with curiosity and see if any diamonds are hiding amongst the chaos.
Just don't invite Lizzo, k?
