Today’s post is the first of a two-part series about creativity and growth in your photography journey. These tips are for all of you who consider yourselves practicing creatives and for my friends who are just embarking on this journey. Five years ago when I first started my lifestyle family photography business. I did not think of myself as having any creativity and was certain I was last in line when God handed out creative talent at birth. Technical skills I could master, but creative + artistic vision . . . that was for the select few. Definitely not me!
However, five years into my photography journey, I have learned so much about cultivating creativity. I spent the first three years hustling hard. I doubled down on all the technical aspects of photography, however, I realized I was not growing as much as I had hoped, and that left me with one giant AH-HA moment. I finally realized that “If you want to grow as an artist, you MUST step away from your craft occasionally and cultivate creativity for the sake of creating. This past January I started that process. Normally when I would be hustling to start another 365, I put the camera down and tried to find my inner artist.
Below are just a few of the life-changing daily and weekly habits I have started in 2019 thanks to the Artist Way by Julia Cameron. I promise there is more to come about the whole journey in a future blog post, but here are my takeaways thus far.
1. Start with a journey into your soul.
The journey into myself started with old school journaling, a stream of conscious writing, three pages longhand EVERY DAY. Julie Camera refers to them as your Morning Pages. I do this first thing daily as basically a brain dump. I have discovered this is a life-giving practice of filling blank pages with whatever comes to mind. Usually, it starts with surface level thoughts but as you keep writing the dreams that have been buried and your prayers that you have been wanting to pray come surfacing up. They bubble up and come flowing out onto the page. Ideas I didn’t even know I had. This is the beginning of the “flow”. The beginning of cultivating your creative side.
2. The artist dates and the journey to find yourself.
The concept of an artist date was a little much for me at first. Scheduling a time to do something on your own that was creative. Who has time for that, right? Well, the artist dates that I have done in January have been LIFE GIVING and have filled my soul in ways that I could not even fathom. The artist dates have shown me that joy of creating and experiencing without productivity or an end goal in mind. Yes . . . for many of you that would be called PLAY!
My favorite artist date in January was a trip to our local gourmet market. Through my journaling, I remembered how much I once loved to cook and enjoyed savoring fresh, gourmet food. As a busy mom with a family and loads of after school activities, grocery shopping has been reduced to shipments on Amazon Prime and curbside pick-up. At the market, I was free to stroll, linger and explore the senses at will. Taking in the beautiful colors of the project, the smells of the spice bins and coffee and tastes of the cheese + bread samples. A full hour of lingering over the sights, sounds, and smells of food can heighten anyone’s senses. I left feeling energized and more fully aware of all of the goodness in my daily life.
3. Develop hobbies for the sake of having a hobby.
This one is hard for me as I can turn anything into a job and own in like a boss. Productivity is my middle name and basically, everything in my life is calculated on how it will impact some kind of end result. So developing a hobby for the sake of having a hobby? It seemed crazy and frivolous for so many years.
Through the practice of journaling, I remembered that my first job in high school was at a florist. The smells of all of those flowers still take me back, but the thing I love best about flowers is the colors. A quick glance around my house showed zero fresh flowers and I could not remember why. So queue the Trader Joe’s floral department and YouTube. I mean you really don’t have any excuses this day in age with YouTube, right? So one of my new hobbies is attempting simple floral arrangements each week. My big goal is to design some a floral arrangement for my grandmother’s 96th birthday in a few weeks but that it. Developing a hobby for the sake of just having a hobby will bring life to your overworked soul!
Finally, I would love to leave you with some inspiration. Taking time to cultivate my creativity has been life changing and it’s only been four weeks. My heart is lighter, my soul feels less cluttered and I have a heightened awareness of all of the beauty and delight more in the details of each day. I hope this post has inspired you to go on your own creative journey. I promise I will be back next week with the three other life-changing habits I have developed as part of this journey.
Finally, I am in a blog circle this month. Check out this amazing beach photography session by St. Pete Beach Photographer Dana DiSalvo! Her work is beautiful. I love her use of color and composition.
SENIOR | FAMILY | NEWBORN | SCHOOLS
Shelly Niehaus Photography is a Prosper, TX-based senior and family photographer. I specialize in newborns, seniors, family, and school portrait photography in the Dallas Fort Worth area. I also offer adoption photography for local families through the Red Thread Organization and volunteer for The Gold Hope Project. For more information please contact me so we can start discussing your session.
This is some really good advice! It’s so easy to forget the actual creative side of photography when you start seeing it as a business!
[…] first three life-changing habits I have incorporated into 2019 to foster creative growth, visit Part I: Creating Space for Creativity + Growth in Your Photography Journey. This week I will touch on two more game-changing habits that have been key to my creative […]
Wonderful tips! I absolutely love your images!
Love all your vibrant colors and your tips on cultivating creativity!
I love how you capture food! I struggle with it and found some great inspiration here!
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I love your tips for cultivating creativity and also what you say about thinking you weren’t a creative person.
I think your insights are brilliant for anyone looking to develop a creative strain or those with creativity bursting at the seams – the supermarket trip is fantastic, I’ll be taking that onboard for sure.
This article is so timely. I’ve been realizing that part of my self-care needs to be shooting for the sake of shooting and creating what drives me. I look forward to reading the next installment of your thoughts on this!! Incredibly enlightening!!
I really like the idea of having a hobby for the sake of having a hobby. It’s easy to just do the day to day. Branching out is so important