Expansive Creativity: 4 C's to Enrich Your Creative Life
- creatingconfidentl
- Feb 18
- 5 min read
I 've talked about many Cs in relation to creativity over the years, but I do believe this is the first time I’ve chosen these four.
Creativity is expansive. It is not niching down or boxing yourself off, or rather it doesn’t have to be. It is stepping out into the world and taking up space; learning, growing, doing, making, becoming, searching, enjoying. All of these things are loud and big and full. Today I want to look at four tools to deepen your relationship with creativity and step more fully and confidently into your creative life.
Curating a Creative Life
I am fairly eclectic; not overtly so, but I don’t have matching furniture, I don’t colour coordinate my bookshelves, and I use pop figures as accents for my decor. I love for my life to be on the walls of my home, to fill it to the rafters. However, I have endeavored to curate my little collection of creative display pieces and spend copious amounts of time rearranging little corners and walls until I feel like it captures the feeling I’m looking for when I’m in that space. I do the same thing with my curating notebook of ideas - for the blog and my novels, as well as tuning into what I really want to fill my time with in terms of creative consumption.
Curation is the act of carefully choosing what exactly it is you want and then thoughtfully organizing and presenting those chosen items. In relation to a creative life, curation takes on the connotation of being intentional about what you devote your time and creative energy to - whether that be displays of what you love in terms of art, or what projects you take on, or what mediums you support. The key is: be picky, be selfish, be particular. You are the creator of your life, so curate it with love and care and creativity.
Spaces - I have loved curating the art and accents and books displayed throughout my home, declaring that I live there, showcasing what I love. Each year we attend Fan Expo Canada in Toronto and my main goal is to curate more pieces of art that speak to me and about me for my creative spaces through my home.
Thought Arena - I carry a notebook with me always to distill, capture, and thereby curate my creative ideation before it manifests in my practice. One could argue this blog is a curated thought arena, displaying my carefully considered and selected ideas about creativity, the creative life, and what I want to share surrounding the creative practice. One last example might be my journal, a carefully chosen paper stock, binding, size combination in which I curate my thoughts and self talk through exploration.
Consumption - This has been a focus of mine so far this year. There is so much creativity in the world from music to movies, art and writing not only circulating but readily available that it becomes overwhelming to wade through if not curated. I have a particular weakness for books. So my focus is on ARCs of indie authors, completing series I already own, and tackling my enormous physical TBR which has been picked over and slimmed down as much as humanly possible.
Cultivating the Creative Practice
Cultivation requires an acquisition of skills and a dedicated effort to using them in order to achieve a level of proficiency or desired outcome. That isn’t to say productivity is required or even the goal; rather the goal is to learn and nurture skills and ‘structures’ (I use the term loosely) to build, in this case, a creative practice.
In the cultivation of creativity routine is essential to build a practice that fits into your life. I’ll link all the posts discussing routine and structure at the end of this post. For now, suffice it to say that routine creates a sense of necessity and expectation around a creative practice by embedding it into a ritual that occurs in your day but has the flexibility to occur at any given time in a sequence of events - perhaps not at seven pm, but after dinner and before your bedtime routine.
Growth - To cultivate a creative practice means we have to be open to and in fact in search of growth; in our creative skills, ability, capacity, and understanding. It does not mean infinite expansion or scale. This kind of growth is a hunger for increasing one’s appetite for creativity and wanting to deepen your connection to it through practice and dedication.
Consistency - I snuck in a fifth C! This one has also been featured many times on the blog, but it is a fundamental core concept in building a creative practice. I’ll link the blog with the consistency master list at the bottom as well. Consistency, whatever that looks like for you, is paramount in building a practice that cultivates growth and enjoyment in your creativity.
Curiosity in Pursuit of Creativity
Curiosity: a spark, an engine, a mindset. Creativity does not exist without a kernel of curiosity. Even when your creativity feels mundane or pedestrian (which happens when we keep our creativity small or don’t see it within our lives), it is all about being curious about yourself, your world, and your desire to create within it.
Creativity answers questions; what if, how would, can I, dare I. It seeks to make sense of the world around us and within us. How can we hope to engage with these ideas without a sense of curiosity? It reminds us to play and frolic while asking us to interrogate and experiment.
Spark - The initial desire to do. Curiosity doesn’t always feel big and adventurous. It can be a fleeting moment of awe, a quiet question, a small detail. Whatever it is that captures your attention or piques your interest, follow that spark of curiosity and turn it into a roaring fire.
Engine - Curiosity keeps your creativity moving forward. It is the force that keeps you creating, starting projects, driving you to finish them. The jump to try something new and embrace creativity in your life. The engine of curiosity is never satisfied, always striving for more, contentedly seeking.
Mindset - Looking at your life, at the world, with openness, wonder, and questions is a state of mind. It takes time to cultivate that inner voice, but once you do, creativity becomes second nature; second to that innate curiosity.
Capacity for Creative Fulfillment
One’s capacity for anything must be gained through exposure. Creativity requires the same, but it isn’t exposure to creativity itself. To create capacity for creativity we must expose ourselves over and over again to vulnerability, uncertainty, newness, the beginner, the cringe, and the power of exploring our own hidden depths of creative energy.
Our capacity for creativity is endless. We want to consume and create in equal measure always. Building up our tolerance for the toll creating can take and expanding our capacity beyond what feels safe and comfortable takes learning and time to master. It is teaching ourselves how to encompass this capacity for creativity in a healthy, productive way that allows us to avoid burnout and enjoy the journey.
Tolerance - This isn’t a sign to tolerate your creativity in the capacity of a burden or something you must simply endure. The definition of tolerance as it relates to creativity lies in unlocking increased capacity to safely engage with and dive into your creative pursuits without threats like burnout looming too near. This comes from increased practice, duration, intensity, and volume.
Learning - Another way to increase one’s capacity for creative fulfillment is to continue learning in your discipline, about yourself, and about the boundless possibilities of creativity in your life. It is uncomfortable to be a beginner, especially once you think you’ve achieved mastery, and perhaps you do achieve mastery of a technique or specific skill, but to increase your capacity for creativity to fully flourish within you, being a lifelong learner is critical.
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