Kerry Says: Find Your Creative Space

Recently, I've been giving a lot of thought to my creative space as an integral part of my process as a writer of poetry. In researching the psychological need for creative environments, I came across several interesting articles, which I thought I would share with you today.

PsychCentral.com has an interesting article entitled, Creating an Environment that Nurtures Your Creativity, which introduces the topic thus:  If you’re a photographer, your most important environment might be the great outdoors. If you’re a writer, you might prefer coffee shops or libraries for weaving your stories. If you’re an artist, you might have an entire garage dedicated to painting or sculpting. Or maybe you don’t have a hub but several spaces where your creativity blossoms. Your environment is a precious resource — among many — for cultivating creativity. What you surround yourself with and consume can ignite your imagination (or stifle it). The article goes on to cite what selected writers and artists have said about the importance of creative space.

PsychologyToday.com stresses the need for solitude in the creative process: What's really blocking our joy in relationships, our creativity, and our peace of mind? One surprising answer, in this age of alienation, is a lack of solitude. Meaningful alonetime, it turns out, is a powerful need and a necessary tonic in today's rapid-fire world. Indeed, solitude actually allows us to connect to others in a far richer way. We live in a society that worships independence yet deeply fears alienation: our era is sped-up and overconnected...Yet in another, more profound way, we are terminally out of touch. The need for genuine and constructive aloneness has gotten utterly lost, and, in the process, so have we. This really struck a chord with me. I posed a question on OLM recently regarding where our poets like to write poetry and was struck by how many said late at night, during hours of insomnia. 

There is a lot of hype around creative, ergonomic office environments but I am more concerned about the creative space we as poets create inside our own minds. We may surround ourselves with books, interesting pictures and objects, even set up our desks in front of an open window, but most of our creative process goes on inside our own heads.
Therefore, for this challenge, I ask that you give some thought to this concept of Creative Space in your writing. Whether your approach to the theme is literal, figurative, symbolic or zen is entirely up to you. However, I ask that you write something new, to fulfill the challenge aspect of this prompt. Our Linkys do not expire and this challenge may run over to Thursday or later. I will be certain to follow up on all poems linked to the post.

Warehouse photo credit: _Hadock_ via photopin cc
Spiral staircase photo credit: seier+seier via photopin cc
Creative Interior photo credit: ali edwards via photopin cc