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Re: What do YOU do when creativity dries up?



On 10/17/11 6:22 PM, Simeon Harris wrote:
all good advice

i fell into a similar situation some years ago and found my way out by
simply doing some work. the music is in you, it's always in you and
it's always available to you.
I've used most of the techniques already mentioned; many successfully, 
some not.
Similar to Simeon's suggestion, there's one more (slightly dangerous?) 
method that I've used when hitting a creative brick wall: keep 
working... and working, and working, and working....
I'll force myself to continue bashing and bashing away at a composition, 
even though I feel creatively spent.  It may take another 3 or 4 or 5 
hours straight, but eventually I'll reach a point at which something 
inspiring comes up.  At that point, the creative process gets 
kickstarted and continues from there.  I'll probably get another couple 
hours of good creative work done.  The next morning, I'll be able to 
look at what I've got and be inspired by it enough to continue working 
creatively.
I think that, as Sim mentioned, the music is always in you.  In my case, 
it's merely a matter of beating the crap out of the creative block until 
it finally gives up from sheer exhaustion, and the music flows out again.
Another possibility that occurred to me this moment...  I've not used it 
to break a creative block, but there have been times where I've taken an 
instrument into the bedroom and laid back on the bed, relaxing while 
plunking away.  There's some rather interesting stuff that comes out by 
playing in an automatic, half-awake/half-napping state.  That might be 
useful to try when attempting to bust through a block.
        --m.