Not What I'd Planned To Learn...

Today, Creativity taught me a lesson without me looking for a theme.

Creativity = Adaptability = Creativity

My day was full of times when I had to suddenly spin on a dime and change plans:

• Sunday School began again today at church and our kick off had kids in rather high spirits, so Nick came up with the idea to do a few parachute games with them to wear off some steam and gradually calm them down to focus.  It meant we had to adapt the rest of the lesson on the spot, but the kids were in a much better space to listen and then move to the craft than they would have been otherwise.

• Back at home, we cut up the bag of older potatoes to make 2 recipes, one for supper today and another one for later in the week.  We had enough sliced that I needed to make a 3rd dish or let the potatoes go bad, so I threw together my very first potato scallop (as they say here instead of scalloped potatoes) to reheat for yet another meal this week if I am teaching.

• I had a meeting to attend tonight that hadn’t made it on to the Master Calendar and I’d planned to work on something else tonight, so I took one of my extra props for the Hoarding Your Creativity class I am teaching at the CreativFestival in Toronto next month and added to that while I was listening and taking part in the discussions.

All of these prompted today’s Inhale and Exhale...

INHALE: Take a very deep breath.  It is Sunday night and you are about to head into another week.  No matter how well you think you have things planned out, you will NEVER be able to control or predict everything that can happen to you.  Instead of panicking when things have to turn on a dime, try to remember that by nurturing your inner creativity, you will be better equipped to handle that chaos and turn it into something creative, to come up with solutions to problems, to find the humour in the moment or joy that will keep you going.  If nothing else, you know you can stop and find a can of play-doh to squish out your frustrations on later!  Move gently into the week ahead and just keep taking it one breath at a time.

EXHALE:  Creativity does not have to happen at a specific time. This first week and a bit, I was trying to carve out certain times  of the day when I would be creative.  Today taught me that when I try to live in a state of Creative awareness, I am much more flexible and less panicky when things don’t go according to some inner plan.  So.... set the timer for 10 minutes.  In your book, write down 3 things about the week ahead that are worrying you and space them far apart on the paper.  Beside each one, write down as many ways to confront those worries and find solutions for them, ideas on how to change them, people you could lean on for support, delegate tasks to etc.  When the timer beeps... STOP.  Slam the book closed with a resounding thud and leave your worries where they are.  Then go do something fun like have a hot bath or read a good book!

NOTE FOR THE WEEK AHEAD - See if you can find a digital camera to keep near you (if you are lucky enough to have a cell phone that takes pictures, then this will be easy) I’ve been noticing things around me the more I go looking, so some of the things I am going to try this week to Inhale Creativity may involve snapping pictures.  If you are following along on this adventure, you may want to try your own explorations of the themes.