Discussion: The Artist‘s Way - renewing your creative energy

[mekare]

So, I‘ve heard of this book for long time but never got round to check it out of a library (my current one doesn‘t have it and interloan is reserved for academic books only). So I got the audiobook since that is what I can most easily fit into my day.

ETA: I forgot to mention the full title: Julia Cameron - The Artist‘s Way, first published in 1992

I have a couple of questions after having listened to the first chapter:

1. Has anyone here ever read/worked with the whole book?

While the tools sound useful, the time commitment per day and per week seems pretty daunting.

2. How do you recharge your creative energies?

The idea that I need to take a break after a challenge/deadline/larger piece with something simpler or less stressful wasn‘t new to me, but the idea of doing this very regularly somehow made me go: „huh“. Cameron compares our creative energy reservoir to a pond with big, small and medium fish (art ideas). We need to refill it regularly.

Here is the passage from the book:

Overtapping the well, just like overfishing the pond, leaves us with diminished resources. We fish in vain for the images we require. Our work dries up and we wonder why, “just when it was going so well.“ The truth is that work can dry up because it was going so well.
As artists we must learn to be self-nourishing. We must become alert enough to consciously replenish our creative resources as we draw on them - to restock the trout pond, so to speak.

Her idea is the “active pursuit of images to refresh our artistic reservoirs“. So, fun, mystery, magic, delight, doing what interests you. Changing known routes to work, or engaging the senses is also mentioned, as well as repetitive regular actions (rhythm being the key) like cooking, knitting, needlework, showering or driving.

What do you do?

Comments

[amberdreams]

I’m with micfic - I rarely read non fiction/serious books, and I also find a lot of self help advice tomes annoying, so I doubt I’d get far with this book. But I’ve picked up hints and tips all around, and generally a pick’n’mix approach seems to suit me.
I’m learning all the time, so trying things from YT videos, doing a sketch booking class which pushes me out of my comfort zone, along with the variety of fandom challenges seem to keep me going. I have stopped writing though, and would like to return to that sometime.
I’m thinking maybe the fact I stopped going to the gym actually made writing more difficult, because that down time, when there are no distractions from tv, internet etc, did used to be a very fertile time for coming up with ideas for my stories.