To create is to exhale. To create is to practice being attentive to what’s right here. To gather the questions, curiosities, and half-finished ideas,
and create:
Conversation.
A shared space.
A few words on a page.
Art.
Creativity is not about making a product. Of course, it can become that, but before it does, to create is to join, to bring things together and make something new.
Just by being alive each day, you are taking in all day. You are receiving constant input; you are processing, inhaling. From things you read to conversations you have and everything in between, the experience of taking it all in can feel endless. Even if you have good intentions of sorting through it all, it’s easy to feel overwhelmed.
Because of this, allowing yourself to have space where you can let those things just be is worth cultivating. Even if it’s just a messy journal entry in the journal you haven’t been “keeping up” with every day. Even if it’s just one conversation with someone that doesn’t lead to some grand revelation, but you know that you attempted to create a space to be present.
Allow yourself to cultivate and make space for the ways creativity can come alive right here. Let it be the kind of creativity that doesn’t wait for perfection or a reason to produce a polished, finished product. Let it be the kind of creativity that welcomes a practice of attentiveness, right here where you are. And let gratitude arise from having been present to this process, knowing that it matters to create space to exhale in this way, however and wherever you can. – Morgan Harper Nichols
