Do you ever feel like this?
Photo Credit: Dave-F, Flickr Creative Commons
When you can’t quite find your creative groove, it can make you a little nuts! Check out these common obstacles to creativity—and then see what you can do to overcome them.
Ten Obstacles to Creativity
- Interruptions
- Lack of interruptions (aka breaks)
- Stress
- Lack of exercise
- Over-long hours and burnout
- Not taking yourself seriously
- Inability to take criticism
- New project-itis (aka inability to finish)
- Inability to let a project go (aka perfectionism)
- A loud inner critic
Resources to Overcome!
…to help deal with interruptions
- Flow, by Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi
- Writing in Flow, by Susan K. Perry
…on the benefits of taking breaks
- 4 Tips for Using Breaks to Work Less and Produce More, by Nate Klemp, PhD
…for more information about how stress, exhaustion, interruptions, exercise, and more impact your mind
- Brain Rules, by John Medina (plus see yesterday’s review of Brain Rules)
…on burnout
- Recover from Writing Burn Out: 18 Tips for Writing with Gusto, by Tess Marshall
- How To Cope With Writing Burnout, by Sharon Hurley Hall
- Writers’ Burnout Quiz: Do You Need a Break?, by Yours Truly (just for fun!)
…to take yourself seriously
- 7 Habits of Serious Writers, by Ali Luke
- 25 Things I Want to Say to So-Called “Aspiring” Writers, by Chuck Wendig (thanks for the recommendation to my fantastic blogging friend, K.T.Hanna!)
- Tips for the Time-Strapped Writer, by Yours Truly
…on taking criticism
- 10 Skills Every Writer Needs, by Yours Truly
…on perfectionism
- The Rocky Road of Perfectionism, by Sharon S. Esonis, PhD
- The Inner Demon That Trumps Them All, by Sue Mitchell
- Why Can’t I Finish?, by Elizabeth Grace Saunders
…to tackle your inner critic
- Befriending the Gremlin: Your Inner Critic and You, by Cynthia Morris
- Tricks for Side-Stepping the Inner Critic, by Yours Truly
…overall inspiration
- 7 Wise Ways to Find Focus and Get Things Done, by Ciara Conlon
- Change Anything, by Kerry Patterson, Joseph Grenny, David Maxfield and Ron McMillan
- One Small Step Can Change Your Life: The Kaizen Way, by Robert Maurer Ph.D. (Thanks to Sue Mitchell for pointing me to this book, which I read in an evening. Short and inspiring!)
- 10 Laws of Productivity, by the Behance Team
- The Nine Modern Day Muses (and a Bodyguard): Ten Guides to Creative Inspiration, by Jill Badonsky (thanks to Carole Jane Treggett for recommending this and the next three books!)
- War of Art, by Steven Pressfield
- Fearless Creating, by Eric Maisel
- A Voice of Her Own: Women and the Journal-Writing Journey, by Marlene A. Schiwy
Do you have any resources to add? Or obstacles to creativity you’d like to address? Please share in the comments!
Hey hon 😀 I would actually recommend people subscribe to this blog too: http://terribleminds.com/ramble/ I can’t say how often his 25 lists hit home for me.
Also – I love your blog. Obstacles are always there, it’s how we deal with them that lets us get to the end.
Hi there! I checked out terribleminds.com/ramble — and wow, is he funny! I’ve added one of his “25-lists” to my recommendations above. Thanks for the tip!
Just wow, Cheryl! I don’t really have any resources to add, but this list is AMAZING! Thank you so much for putting all these in one place. I could spend HOURS clicking through the links. Thanks!
Hey there–sorry, I think my earlier reply didn’t go through :P. I just wanted to say thank YOU for your kind words. I’m so glad the list is helpful!
Hi Cheryl,
Wonderful list; thanks so much for taking the time to provide all these excellent resources to your readers!
I’ve owned Susan Perry’s Writing in Flow for years and am going through it again recently.
Here’s a few more of my favs I’d recommend:
1. Jill Badonsky’s extremely useful and hilarious book, The Nine Modern Day Muses (and a Bodyguard): Ten Guides to Creative Inspiration
2. War of Art – Steven Pressfield (Out, out, damned Resistance! lol)
3. Fearless Creating – Eric Maisel
4. A Voice of Her Own: Women and the Journal-Writing Journey – Marlene A. Schiwy (This last one isn’t just for memorists;it has helped me in overcoming obstacles to creativity too!)
Hi Carole,
Awesome! I own one of those, have two of them on my to-read list, and the last one is new to me–and just added to that to-read list. I’ll add them to the list.
Thanks for the recommendations
Hmm, that would be ‘memoirists’
I love this Cheryl! Thanks, just what the doctor ordered. #1 is haunting me.
#1 was definitely on my mind when I wrote it–I think the kids had a snow day and I was having trouble staying focused!
Great resource. Have linked it to The Funnily Enough.
mood
Thank you muchly! Thanks for stopping by
Thanks so much for the link, Cheryl! And what a fantastic round-up of resources, too — I love Chuck’s piece, and will have to dig into some of the others (when I’m not supposed to be writing ;-))
Ah, yes, that’s the trick–finding time to *read* all these fantabulous resources…Thanks for the comment, and thanks for the great posts on your end, too!
Great round-up, Cheryl, and thanks for including my post.
My pleasure–I really enjoyed it. It’s in my file of starred blog posts so I can revisit it as needed :).
This is a gold mine! I’m bookmarking *and* Stumbling this because I want to be able to go back to it when needed. Thank you so much for pulling all of this together for us.
I second Carole’s recommendation of The War of Art. It’s a very easy read and has done wonders for me in overcoming resistance. Eager to explore some of the others on the list that I haven’t read yet.
Great list of resources, Cheryl! War of Art by Steven Pressfield is a great one. I also have his other book, Do the Work. I will definitely be checking out the other recommendations as well!