Skip to main content

Exercising the creative mind

Exercising the Creative Mind

 One must still have chaos in oneself to be able to give birth to a dancing star.
Friedrich Nietzsche

The creative mind is truly unique.  There is no beginning or end to the possibilities that it can provide.  Images, stories, ideas, concepts, thoughts, are borne from this mind and it can exhaust itself to the point of collapse.  Stands to reason when there is so much of a thought process going on;  a bombardment of everything, constantly.  Nietzsche describes it as chaos.  I'm going to have to agree.  For the creative mind there may never be rest and while it is a precious thing to have, it can be also be destructive.  Withdrawal into this world, all alone can be a common escape, for it is the world that is ours, one that we can only see and one that we can only understand.  This though, is not conducive to long term productivity of the art form and in looking at successful creatives there is one stand alone act that they all employ to serve their craft successfully.  Exercise.
This can be hard to maintain because the body can become so tired when it is in constantly thinking, conjuring up plans and ideas.  When I did a short stint in primary teaching, after teaching in secondary for a while, I took it upon myself to be a little creative in the way that I approached my class.  I used to take my class out every morning before formal teaching for a run or a walk around the oval, twice.  This made the world of difference to the students learning capabilities.  I found the students were calmer, receptive and eager to participate in the curriculum that I had devised.  Therefore their minds became open to new ideas, not only that, but their thinking took on a more systematic structure.  Their ideas could flow.  Anyone in business understands that 'Flow' is what drives the work environment, for without 'flow' there is no effectiveness.  Applicable in the classroom and most certainly applicable to creatives whose minds in many ways never stop.  

Exercise for the creative has to be daily in some form or another.  It allows the mind to stop for a while, re boot, systemise those wonderful thoughts that swirl unabashedly forever, begging to be turned into entities in the physical world as creations for all to be enjoyed.  

It doesn't have to be tedious.  It has to be enjoyable.  I dance, always have, ever since I was a little girl, and I do this at least four times a week in the studio, the rest of the days may not be as strenuous or sweat inducing, but that is ok.  My productivity, flow, creativity has been able to become a better reality, in that my creations are orderly, systemised.  It is such a necessary part for any artist or creative, exercise the physical body in some way and the mind will find a way to make the chaos make sense.  Let the dancing star come out from all the chaos, as Nietzsche so aptly reminds us to do! 








Stella Dimadis
July 2014

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Writer's block

Writer's block The Writer's responsibility is to his art.  He will be completely ruthless if he is a good one.  He has a dream.  It anguishes him so much he must get rid of it.  He has no peace until then... William Faulkner  Having written films, articles, essays, reports, it has always, at one stage or another, plagued me when I have had writer's block.  That moment when I sit staring at the computer screen as if it is an alien standing it's ground in a duel for battle with me.  Eyeing me, daring me to drop my weapons of my imagination.  The frustration builds up and chocolate beckons, serenading the virtues of itself.  It is all too familiar, this battle, and I may have thrown my writing in all together had it not been for my editor in the late 90's when I completed some articles for Who Weekly. I remember grizzling into the phone line with him that my writing was not perfect...there was something missing...I couldn't pinpoint it....
2 comments
Read more

Memories are the key not to the past, but to the future.

"Memories are the key not to the past, but to the future. "   Corrie Ten Boom Corrie Ten Boom was a Dutch watchmaker, who had helped many Jews escape during the Holocaust, was a prisoner and then a writer.  She held many memories, no doubt, fears; images that would stay forever and haunt her, but they were able to unlock a future for her that she would never have imagined.  Her writing and her boldness initiated her knighthood by the Queen of the Netherlands, The King's College in New York City named a new women's house in her honour, her book "The Hiding Place", was  made into a feature film, twice. Locked away in our computer hard drives are examples of our work and lives that we lock away when our computer sleeps, forgetting about their importance because we are always told to focus on the now, forgetting about our past.  Well, perhaps it is time that we also learn to love our past, regardless of what it was like, so that we can understand what our...
Post a Comment
Read more

Cruella

Cruella “Cruella was in a box a long time, now Estella can be the one who makes guest appearances!” -Cruella Every so often, a film encapsulates all of the factors that make it ‘wow’, leaving the audience totally satisfied.  Cruella, directed by Craig Gillespie, starring Emma Stone, Emma Thompson, screenplay by Dana Fox and Tony McNamara, produced by Disney does exactly that. It was released in Australia on May the 27th, 2021, not the best year for a release due to the Pandemic and inherent lockdowns in this country, but nevertheless a real treat on any screen. The film follows Estella before she becomes Cruella De Vil; a gifted, precocious girl whose rebellious streak, fighting spirit and desire to become a fashion designer is the perfect mix for her journey through life.  She was orphaned at 12 from whom she thought was her biological mother, but of course the apple doesn’t fall far from the tree and with the help of her two childhood partners, Horace and Jasper, Estella e...
Post a Comment
Read more