How To Create The Unexpected

By: Beatriz Verneaux

Staying in tune with what’s current and fresh is vital for making it in the music world. However, the most iconic artists in every generation are the ones who took ten steps towards directions no one else seemed to be taking.

People like David Bowie and Michael Jackson seem to have always been doing what the mainstream audience didn’t expect. Pushing boundaries in creativity is what takes us from musicians to artists. Every once in a while we must remember why we create art. Without further ado, here’s our:

5 Ways To Connect With Your Creativity

1. Focus On Your Emotions

When working as musicians on a daily basis, we sometimes enter these moments of rut where we think about the technical aspect of song crafting, skill developing or marketing. We forget the basic reason why we became musicians which is, to express ourselves.

Take some pressure off of your guitar and journal. Try one of the following techniques: free writing for 15 minutes (writing without stopping to check what you wrote until time’s up), recollect a specific memory in detail (colors, texture, emotions, scents), or even writing about a song you enjoy and how it makes you feel. If it isn’t your thing, don’t worry! Sit and chat with a close friend about your feelings.

You can play video games later. Talk to your cat if you don’t want to open up with your friend. Whatever you choose to do to feel comfortable connecting with what makes you feel your feelings, just make sure you’re intentionally doing it!

2. Practice Some Other Form Of Art (don’t show it to anyone)

Children say the darnest things! And that’s because there’s very little censoring going on in their mind. Think about it: kids are always creating something. They’re always drawing, singing, telling wild stories… making art just for the sake of it! If you’re stuck in a creative rut and can’t get a song out no matter what, try drawing about it – anything goes, even stick figures with a sad face.

If not drawing, take up photography or videography. If you’re not good with visuals, try writing a short story or a poem. Remember: you don’t have to share this with anyone else. Nobody needs to know you’re not Leonardo DaVinci. Have fun with yourself. I bet as a child you would dance and draw without a thought.

3. Connect With Nature

This is probably good advice for anybody, at any point in their lives. Guess what? Humans are animals. Shocking, I know. We need to feel the earth beneath our feet, and experience fresh air and salty water. Connecting with what’s beyond us also helps us connect with ourselves.

In more practical ways, being exposed to sunlight promotes vitamin D, and exploring nature in a hike, while swimming or engaging physically through exercising clearly contributes with endorphin and dopamine. So even if you’re a vampire, you should still go to moonlit hikes to get those good chemicals flowing in your body. Focusing our attention on something that’s so beyond human existence can truly promote us to get out of our minds.

4. Seek Out Art

I don’t mean go to your best friend’s show every weekend. Go to an art show of a local photographer who’s been in Australia for ten years exploring wildlife. Go to a show of a band whose music is very different from yours, which will challenge you to experience their music instead of comparing or thinking about yours. Go to a museum and sit with a painting that catches your attention.

Watch a documentary of a visual artist, a fashion designer, or a writer you feel connected to for whatever reason. Open instagram or pinterest and seek out paintings, illustrations and poems and truly spend time with them.

5. Sit In Silence

This is probably the hardest tip to comprehend, and the simplest one which requires no money, no tools aside from yourself and your ability to sit in stillness. Our lives are constantly bombarded with stimulation – from music, to social media, our relationships, our daily concerns, good ol’ netflix..

So try this challenge: sit with yourself with no music, no distractions, for about two minutes and see just how far your mind wanders. Try for longer next time. No matter how long you can do it, the benefits of being in touch with our inner self can bring up insights we wouldn’t know if we’re constantly distracted.

How will you use these tools and ideas in your artistry? I’d love to hear from you.

Article by Beatriz Verneaux