Mindfulness is a key part of a creative self-care practice. Nourishing your inner spark is a mental act as much as it is an emotional and spiritual one, offering up the opportunity for you to honor, expand and be in the flow of your creative gift moment to moment.
Yet, “minding” the way you talk to yourself and the choices you make, especially during the holiday season, can be a bit challenging to put into action.
Between personal holiday commitments and the need for small businesses and entrepreneurs to wrap things up while also calling on inspiration to plan for the year ahead, it’s easy to lose track of taking care of base creative needs. The flip side is that when self-care goes out the window, it’s extra hard to feel inspired, creative or visionary – creating a catch-22 energy loop.
During the last month of the year, supporting family, clients or close friends can make you last on your own list, especially when it comes to creative self-care. This challenge is doubly hard for empaths.
To help you maintain your sanity, and keep your creative fires burning during this last month of the year, I will focus on the mind, body, emotion and spirit components of a creative self-care practice, featuring a different theme each week. My hope is that these posts will inspire you to consider down time, shifting your mental and emotional perspective and taking mini-breaks as a regular part of your creative self-care and well-being routine, rather than the exception.
After all, creativity is the window you have into the divine within. It’s up to each of us to be honest when the mind is being clogged up with expectations, fears, old patterns and opinions of others, and put energy into crafting a positive mental script to support your inherent creative gifts instead.
To kick off this creative self-care mini-series, let’s focus the mind and it’s influence on the inner creative fire.
Minding the Way your Creativity is Nourished
There is an art to being of service and how to balance it with creative self-care, especially during the holidays. The overall energy vibe can be a mix of endings, missed expectations, year-end duties and social obligations that all feel important to address. When mushed together in a year-end frenzy, these dynamics can bring up a lot of thoughts and emotions to process, while the mind can make you feel like everything is a priority to complete.
By pushing to get it all done and done well, the mind can block out what the body and emotions are sharing with you. The accomplishment becomes more important than the experience, and by the time the holiday arrives you are too ill or exhausted to enjoy being in the present – where creative inspiration is born.
While celebrations bring in an excitement and opportunity for connection with loved ones and a type of energy unique to this time of year, it’s also a way to get an infusion of fresh creative perspective. Are you listening for it?
The Mind is Always Talking to You – Time to Pay Attention to What it’s Really Saying
Here are some simple ways to become more mindful of your current creative self-care practice and how to improve on it.
Start the month by being honest with yourself about where you are and find a way to own it, without judgement. So what if a big creative project fell through or things are taking longer than expected? Can you appreciate what went right, what you learned, and how it all influences where you can mentally focus next?
Look more deeply into the way you talk to yourself in your mind and heart. What words often pop up in your self-talk, especially when you are stressed out? Perhaps you didn’t meet the goals you wanted to this year. Does that mean it’s time to beat yourself up about it, or honor how far you did come or what you learned as whole?
Ask yourself if you are truly open to new inspirations, even if that requires a change in routine, business practices or creative free time. Why or why not? Is there a sense of resistance that pops up immediately? Or is there a fear? Meditate on it.
What rules have you created for yourself around this time of year regarding what you need to do vs what will best nourish your body, soul and creative spark? Are you willing to change some of those rules in order to celebrate the holidays and your creative accomplishments in a more balanced way?
Most importantly, can you see how your thoughts set you up to fail? Is there a fear or phrase that keeps repeating itself in your mind? It might also be time to reconnect with and re-clarify your values and give your mental focus a tune-up.
No matter what the holidays represent or bring up for you, remember to find small simple ways to take care of yourself and leave time to spark your own creative interests. If you are dipping into energy reserves just to keep going, it will be that much harder to enjoy the season or notice the creative inspiration in the present moment.
What are some rituals you’ve added to your creative self-care practice this year? Do you see where you can make some mindful improvements?
Interested in reading more posts on a similar topic, check out Honor the Change in Seasons by Reviewing Commitments, Then Redirect Creative Energy. Want to get a jump on sparking creativity in 2017? Connect with me for an intuitive reading or creative coaching session and let’s get planning! Want a source of fresh inspiration to carry you through this month into the new year? Tune into my podcast, Flirting With Enlightenment.