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Creative people are creative because they love to create. They are driven by the idea of making something beautiful. But there are many times in a creative person's life when they become blocked and need some tips to become untangled. Here are some ideas:

1. Relax and accept that you cannot be expected to be on creative command 24 hours a day. Accept that in some cases your creative blockage is a signal that you are due for some much needed down time.

2. When you have refueled and are ready to resume, see everything around you as potential creative inspiration regardless of what you create. A colorful teapot can be equally inspiring to a designer, a painter, or a writer. A lot of creative crashing is created by categorizing creativity. That is to say that I think that creative people pigeon-hole themselves and miss inspiration in something that they think is meant for someone or something else.

3. Go out a lot. The worst thing a creative person can do is to stay contained. Remember above. Inspiration is both indoors and out and it pervades you in the people you will meet.

4. Go to a variety of places. Do not restrict yourself to the same restaurant, the same club, the same gallery, or even the same city or country. Explore.

5. Consider every creative form and try them all. You might be an excellent designer and have no confidence in your painting or writing ability. Stick with your forte, but spend a few days a week on the other forms to see if you like them.

6. Avoid negativity. If someone is discouraging to you, avoid them. If you have a million excuses why your creativity is crippled, create anyway.

7. Participate in activities and events that you would not normally. If you hate TV, for instance, watch it. If reading makes you restless, pick up the novel.

8. Connect with other creative people. I don't mean the typical join a group or an organization sort of thing, your creativity should be too precious to you than that. I mean share your creation with creative, encouraging people close to you. They might give you some intriguing angles to consider.

9. When you are ready to produce the product, avoid an environment full of distractions. Nothing is worse than being prepared to produce and having a refrigerator staring at you.

10. Never throw anything away that contains potential creative material. This might include notebooks, sketch pads, journals, or scraps of paper. But they might all prove valuable at some point in the future. I had tons of old journals and notebooks that contained song lyrics and stories from when I first started writing that could have been used or improved upon. And now I have to recreate all of that lost material and play catch up. So don't discard something you think is irrelevant, out-of-date or not good enough. You might be wrong.

11. Don't overdue your creation. Fix it a few times if it really needs refining. But try not to repeat this fix-it pattern too much with the same product. This might ruin it in the long run and rid you of your real creative self-esteem.

Learn more about this author, Courtney Caswell-Peyton.
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