It’s not hard to find a lot of creative things to do, but having something that is a true practice seems frustratingly incompatible with my life just now. Yet, this is at some other level just an excuse. Creative practice is like any other practice: You have to “just do it.”

I have one more week of teaching introduction to film-making to the schoolkids. That at least has been a weekly practice, as teaching is VERY creative. :)

Without those classes, I must find another way to get something started. Nothing is presenting itself yet, but let’s see when these other crucial events have passed. Hopefully my creative energy will have to go into clever packing and organizing. 4 years ago

Well, the Shuttercal idea just didn’t work for me. Although I take pictures several times a week, just getting them ready and putting them up there seemed like a lot of effort for little reward. I do still like Shuttercal, and maybe I’ll feel differently about it later, but right now I’m looking for a new joint.

I have been doing more drawing lately, and want to practice some of the drawing and visualization exercises I’ve learned. I’m working on an idea that involves both photography and drawing, and possibly archival material too. Right now I’m in a tough place, though. A theme hasn’t yet emerged, so it’s hard to sustain. I have a feeling it won’t, until the thesis is finished and I can turn my full attention to it. 4 years ago

Two new goals to help me do this:

Complete 1 year of ShutterCal, and
Teach film making to young people

Check ‘em out. 4 years ago

I practice my crafts. I am writing and drawing more than ever now, as I sit on this couch recovering from a surgery on my right foot. At times, the pain is too much, and my productivity is low. But that is to be expected, and I’m able to put what energy I have into being creative, instead of berating myself for lacking the discipline to practice. Being an invalid has freed me, in that way.

The surgery, to correct a deformity, involves wearing an appliance pinned in four places through my flesh and then into the bone that runs through my inside arch, connecting to the big toe of my right foot. Although I joke about having a bionic foot, the feeling of having it attached is a just a wee bit monstrous, in the anterior of my consciousness. When not outright painful, it is wearying. Yet for three or four hours a day I can forget the foot, because there is at last nothing I must do so urgently as to write in the Daybook, or play with the pencil, trying to catch the expression on my cat’s placid face. 5 years ago

Working on my portfolio has made me aware of the importance of doing something for my own creative practice, every day. It can be a piece of creative writing, a photograph or work on a video, animation, or illustration.

I would like to alternate between free-form, play-inspired work and focused creative exercises. I have lots of resources for the latter. I can also pull out “The Artist’s Way” and start following the recommendations in there.

Another part of creative practice is writing a Daybook Entry every day. To date I haven’t been successful in doing this in a disciplined way. Instead I blog, which is okay, but few of my posts were about my creative process, until lately. Writing about my creative process seems too narcissistic for a public blog, but maybe I am wrong about that. 5 years ago