Nature can be a great creative guide in showing us how we too follow rhythms
and seasons in our creative journeys just as nature has its own.
My name is Kiran Patel and I am an artist and creative coach and today we will take a look
at the ways our art practices can benefit from using the signals and cycles that nature employs.
If we look at nature it is in a continual state of change and acceptance.
It does not deny its
existence and it does not try to elongate a specific period of time or shorten another.
It allows itself to live full cycles of creation and destruction.
It does not shun aspects of this
cycle and elevate other times.
It moves in its own rhythm and it does not apologize
or justify its movements.
Instead it is in full embrace wherever it finds itself.
When it comes to our art practices we can use the example of nature
as a basis to create our own rhythm and flow to our creativity.
Just as nature seasons so does our creative journey.
We may take a season to percolate and nurture new ideas from seed where we seek and find
inspiration but do not create anything.
Just like winter is a period of bare landscapes
we too may need to take time away from our creative practices and rest all the while.
Just as nature is generating new growth under its barren lands we too
can be incubating ideas and allowing new thoughts to form.
It is all allowed but we can mistake times when we are not creating as blocks or impediments
but we can also take a new perspective and see it as a time to reflect and regenerate.
Nature does not create floral abundance continually.
It takes time to shed and lose
its leaves but it trusts that new growth will once again adorn its branches and we as artists
can also trust ourselves to create when the time is ripe again.
The seasons change and spring turns to summer and abundance alights and we too
would enter times when our creativity flourishes and flows and we can enjoy those fruits
and delight in seeing our artistry come to life.
And just as day follows night and tides ebb and flow we will come to understand that creating
our art is never completed in one dimension or only ever in one season.
We are never always creating or never creating.
We will fluctuate and oscillate between times
of great artistic bounty and all the stages in between where we are in the autumn of our
where we are in the autumn of our creations and our winters where our inspirations and visions
go underground and hibernate to then come up with new shoots of life.
As artists we must learn to trust in our own seasons and not condemn or lose faith that we
have lost all our artistic skill or vision.
Creation doesn't die it evolves and grows
and it needs the movement of seasons to allow for this.
A great benefit is to get to know what our own intuitive and creative cycles resemble.
This is helpful to see so we know that we are not abandoning our calling
if we are in our season of rest and we don't expect continual seasons of abundance
understanding that cycles move in and out of growth and they may move slowly or at speed
but none of this signals that anything has gone wrong.
It is all keeping in time with your own natural creative flow.
Let us now take some time to journal on what our own seasons and cycles may be
when it comes to our creative practices.
This practice can enlighten us to ways
that would be the most suitable for our creative paths.
The following are journal prompts.
Do you feel as though you should be constantly creating and when you are not
do you fear that something is wrong?
When do you feel that you're most creative?
Where you are producing art and can you recollect how long this period lasts?
If you were to mirror the seasons in nature and split your creative process into a similar cycle
how would you define your creative spring,
Summer,
Autumn and winter?
Do you feel that you need more of one season in your artistic process than another?
For example you may feel more inclined to need a longer winter period where you take
a little longer in ideation and inspiration mode than in actively creating art mode.
What would be your ideal creative rhythm and process?
In an ideal world how would you like to create?
Would you like long days and weeks of constant creation or would you like short bursts throughout your day?
Do you allow the time and make space for daydreaming and letting your mind wander
without having to have a physical outcome at the end?
There is no wrong or right with your answers this is just a tool
to discover what rhythm best suits you.
When we get to perceive our own creative cycles with a gentle reminder that nature moves in
similar ways and we are as much a part of this nature as the trees and the seas
we get to engage in our creative practices with more grace and love.
We make a way of creating that is bespoke to us
and honours our own natural ebbs and flows and allows for it all.
I wish you a creative and gentle journey into exploring your artistic seasons.
