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The need for immediate perfection

The obsessive need to achieve perfection comes in different forms. The desire to perform, create and be perfect may initially seem as a great motivation but in most cases it appears to be a crippling detractor resulting in intertia. Perhaps striving for perfection is noble in many ways but demanding from ourselves to immediately create something brilliant fresh can stifle our productivity and even our desire to begin working on a task.  “A different part of our brains is activated when we think about what’s possible rather than what’s required.” - Seth Godin Competing rarely leads to freshness. Speed does not guarantee success or originality either. Depth and insight are the cumulative result from focused effort, clear intention and perseverance over time. Freshness thrives on making connections between seemingly unrelated things. Freshness of thinking requires time to look at things differently and with more curiosity for longer often by not trying to achieve anything else than pur
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10 Ways to (Further) Develop Your Creativity

Do not wait to start until creativity or inspiration to finds you. Just show up at the page/canvas/screen/keyboard and start making something. Anything. Even if you’re making bad or unimpressive stuff in the beginning, that’s OK. What matters is that you keep creating. Always bear in mind that ideas want to materialize through your imagination and your work. In other words, what can be created by you, waits for you to create it. So get to work. Nobody creates masterpieces on a daily bas is. And the more productive you are, the greater chances are that you will be able to create better and more original things. Cultivate your creative habits consistently. Establish your own creative corner . Even if it’s just a table and a chair. Surround yourself with books, designs, quotes, colors, paper or whatever you’ve feel drawn to and intrigued by. Step away from the screen and put your phone in flight mode. Clean up your room, wash the d
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Creativity, Clarity and Opportunity

The passion to create art brings with itself an unimaginable power of healing and beauty. Creativity can be seen as a wonderful prayer as it connects us directly to a higher consciousness. Tapping in its resources requires faith in our ability to be actively patient and confidence in the path that is revealing itself in sometimes mysterious ways. Great art comes from truth and doesn't need validation.  To create is essential if we wish to bring clarity to the realm of possibility. Possibilities are fuzzy, attractive, indefinite and alluring paths we can take. When we choose, we eliminate the noise imposed by less relevant (yet attractive) concepts and focus on what we feel is of value. Ideas come to life when acted upon, not simply recorded and safely placed in a drawer. Sharing them might feel vulnerable but at the same time, it brings us down to the arena of other creators. To be judged or criticized is to be seen, not just looked at. Once our ideas catch on fire, there’s an im
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The Secret Potential of Feeling Stuck

Many want to help us get unstuck in your craft, art and work. But only a few understand that being stuck has its own merrit, place and wisdom. A sense of being stuck should be respected and explored without judgment. If decoded correctly, the value of its information is beyond priceless. It contains clues that no mentor, fellow-creative or friend can ever give us. It’s a guide from a crossroad towards a realm of opportunity. You won’t get to work until the pain of not creating exceeds the pain of creating. — David Bayles Feeling stuck means having a sense of stagnation, not knowing what to do, why we do it, or of not progressing in the direction of our desired objectives. In very simple terms, it signals a lack of confidence, a lack of clarity of purpose. Instead of trying to get out of it as fast as we can, we might choose to view it from a different perspective. Feeling stuck is a portal between the old and the new, the known and the unknown. It is that prolonged moment in time and s
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Creative Affirmations

When you find yourself in need of creative faith, affirmations may come handy. Grounding yourself in emotional stability and regaining the desire to get to work is essential. Here are a few affirmations that may to support you:  What I do is, first and foremost, a reward in itself.  I find joy in what I do.  What matters the most is what I do now, in the present moment.  Whatever I choose to do in the present moment, I do it with my full attention and dedication.  I am committed to the now.  I feel as if time does not exist.  I am constantly learning from the feedback I receive.  I feel I have the skills and capabilities for doing what I love. I feel whole.  ©REBELLICCA, 2021 As artists and creative entrepreneurs, we all need some support and reassurance when we feel our creative muse is slightly less present. Here is an often updated collection of notes-to-self, ideas and suggestions how to appease our creative anxieties so that we can keep doing what we love and enjoying the busines
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What I've learned from Elizabeth Gilbert's Big Magic

Arrogant belonging: declare that you ARE, claim your place in the world. Liberate yourself from the desire to necessarily help others/be of service through your creativity; just make stuff for its own sake, for your own sake. If you love something, persevere. If you love something, believe it loves you back. Regain your curiosity, cultivate your inquisitiveness. Follow each clue, no matter how mundane. Chase every reference. Explore every spark of interest, no matter how fleeting it might be. (Your) Art matters and simultaneously it doesn't matter at all. State it out loud: I am an artist/writer/poet/creator. Rejection is not a valid reason to quit, neither is the lack of audience. Inspiration and ideas seek you to manifest them. Show it you are ready and capable of doing that. Be ready, show up, do. Make commitment to the doing, not to the outcome. As artists and creative entrepreneurs, we all need some support and reassurance when we feel our creative muse is slightly less presen
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Creativity, Uncertainty and Possibility

When you're new to something, Rick Rubin enlightened us, you bring an ignorance that can be highly innovative. The usefulness of experts is indisputable but when you need a breakthrough freshness of insight is a priority. Indeed, so much of what we know somehow stands in the way of developing new perspectives. In a sense, we're at all times hostages to our mental models. And only by becoming familiar with them and aware of them can we learn how to see things from a new angle.  Sometimes we may need to impose constraints on our projects in order to channel our creative energy. At other times, we may be asked to do exactly the opposite: drop the limitations, un-scope and acknowledge the importance of exploring something totally new, even if we don't know where this would lead us to. Unchartered territories obviously don't come with maps. They do, however, come with the promise of allowing us to be the first to map them while navigating them based on our inner compass.  Ne
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