📝 Two Basic (Creative) Tools for Life

Design Journals

‘Creativity is the natural order of life. Life is energy: pure creative energy.’ 

- Julia Cameron, The Artist’s Way

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Some years ago, reading Julia Cameron’s most popular book - The Artist’s Way - sparked the need to reconnect with my creative self. What’s more, it provided me with two basic tools to help bring back creativity to the core of my life. 

These tools are simple, systematic habits that lay out the framework for creativity to happen. Everybody can benefit from these practices - not exclusively artists or designers.

These are basic tools for life.

• Morning Pages are ‘three pages of longhand writing, strictly stream-of-consciousness’ written in the morning before the busy day starts. They are a sort of meditation in which we let ourselves expand, recovering ‘a strong and clear sense of self’, as Cameron puts it.

  For me, the key here is habit building and consistency. ‘Let inspiration find you working’, Picasso said. I started journaling long before I read this book and it has been one of the best long-term positive habits I have brought into my life. Morning pages have provided me with clear thinking, self-awareness, and vision.

• Artist’s Dates ‘is a block of time, perhaps two hours weekly, especially set aside and committed to nurturing your creative consciousness, your inner artist (…), your creative child’. Cameron suggests taking them alone, to have quality time in solitude with oneself. 

  Artists’ Dates are a great tool for learning and filling our ‘inner well’. For expanding our inner library and source of inspiration. They are a great tool for discovery, exploration, and reconnecting with the world.

  When I started my creative recovery some years ago, I use to take myself to life drawing sessions as Artist’s Dates. I am extremely fortunate to live in London, where most of the museums and galleries are free. Walking the city was - and still is - one of my favourite Artists’ Dates. 

Try these two basic tools and don’t be too strict about how frequently to use them. Adapt and re-design them to your needs.

For example, I never stick to the 3 pages in the morning - I just write whatever comes in that day (sometimes 1 page, sometimes 6 pages). Or take Artist’s Dates, I don’t plan to go out and explore alone weekly, I might do that maybe once a month. But I do read a lot - my reading time is my ‘Artist’s (Home) Date’, and I do that every day.

Do what works for you! Remember, the success of these two tools relies on forming a positive habit rather than on performing it according to someone else’s rules.

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Cheers and happy sketching! 💫✏️

Ana