Declutter your mind, and creativity will flourish.
Now, this may sound a bit confusing. When hearing the word “declutter”, you might immediately think of cleaning your house or work space. However, tidying and organizing also takes place in your head. This a more complex task to work on.
Yes, aesthetics is an important aspect to feel that you are in a healthy and pleasing environment. Therefore, if your space is uninspiring or doesn’t reflect “you”, then a redesign might be necessary.
To declutter your mind, though, actions have to go deeper. It takes time, energy, and willingness to dismantle barriers that inhibit creative expression.
Let’s go through a couple of key points.
The source of creativity lies deep within us. Creativity is largely a subconscious and intuitive experience, which means that our internal environment ultimately determines our creative potential.
Hence the importance of self-care and mental health to protect your internal environment. Clutter can intrude your mind as negativity, self-doubt or constant distractions. When you’re not connected to yourself, it’s easy to detach from that intuitive experience and replace it with other activities that grant instant and temporary gratification.
The environment you surround yourself with determines the quality of your creative actions. So here’s a question: If you had to label your thoughts, what would be the constant pattern?
The busy-ness of our work lives locks us into a noisy and distracted state of mental hyperactivity.
Bianca Finkelstein
Being constantly online to catch the latest news or updates regarding ‘x’ product is an endless task. Staying informed is important, and so is unplugging yourself for a couple of hours to enjoy more analogue and human experiences.
Getting access to a massive amount of information isn’t making you any more creative. Slowing down to keep moving forward allows you to come back to your craft fresh and well rested.
Decluttering your mind comes in the form of being selective with the content you consume, how often you consume it, and how often you schedule breaks to assimilate what you’re consuming. It’s impossible to give your full attention to every single post you come across in any online platform.
Lately, I’ve found that Twitter feels overwhelming for me. One thing that has helped me focus on the content that truly matters for me is making lists. The idea is clicking on any of them directly before I’m tempted to scroll down for several minutes or even hours. That way, I’m able to interact with specific individuals or read articles from sources I’ve curated myself.
So far, that has been one decluttering action for me. How about you?