Balancing Your Creative Life

Balancing your creative life with your "real" life can be a bit of a tightrope walk. Creatives never stop. Our minds are in full movement from the time we wake up and often as we sleep. Ideas explode as we stand in line at the grocery store, as we fold the wash, as we cut the grass, as we tuck the kids under the covers, as we work our day job, as we cook dinner and the list could go on forever.

Finding balance between these two lives can often be frustrating, can create animosity, can cause depression or anxiety and can make one reevaluate whether the creative life is really worth the pursuit.

Balance can be found between these two lives as long as you're willing to set some priorities and make some sacrifices.

• Carry a notebook. Always. Write down what's lurking around in your head. The few seconds or minutes are worth the time to keep an idea fresh and go back to it when the timing is more suitable.

• Create creative time in your daily schedule. If this just means you create on weekends, accept that and don't veer from the commitment. If it means one hour after dinner, accept that. Only you can make the time to participate in your creative life.

• Create family time. This is the same application as creative time. Commit to it.

• Recognize your down time. Are you watching too much TV to unwind? Are you surfing the internet to release the tension of the day? Are these activities keeping you from your creative goals?

• Can you sacrifice an hour of sleep to get back to your creative pursuits? Sleep is just as important as the air we breathe, so ask yourself if you can wake up an hour earlier or go to bed an hour later to instill time for your creative life. But keep in mind, lack of sleep can hinder this venture as well as help it. Make sure you get the sleep you need.

• Let your family help you find the time to commit to your creativity. Ask them to take on simple tasks you take on yourself to free up a little time for your art.

• Is your day job affecting your creative life? This one can be a struggle for any creative who wishes to make a career from their art. Keep in mind that the mundane, mind numbing job is your life support at the moment and while you're stuck from 8-5 in someone else's world, your subconscious is continually working in your creative world. Use your notebook. And accept the fact that you have to pay the bills.

• When you're feeling the effects of frustration, animosity, depression, anxiety or you just wonder if it's worth the challenge, take those feelings and apply them to your art. Creation from these feelings can expose a new point of view that can lead to a deeper creativity worth exploring.

Finding balance between your creative life and your "real" life can be challenging, but you're a creative and it takes creativity to make it happen. Explore ideas that you can implement into your life to create time for your creative life.

Peace on your journey - Kerri

Kerri Williams is a creativity coach, a fine art photographer and a writer on a lifelong creative journey. Kerri writes about the creative journey and coaches those seeking their creative passion and/or searching to reclaim their creative journey.

You can learn more about her work and view her photography at http://www.magpistudios.com.

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