What do you do to keep your Muse well-fed and happy? We know we need to feed it, know that inspiration is important to our creative endeavors but what do we actively do to ensure that happens on a regular basis.
That’s what this little chat here is all about. I’ll help you see your muse as something that is within your control to bolster and talk about the many ways you can do that even when its hard because of time constraints or a lack of motivation. So grab a cup of something exciting and yummy and join me for this intimate little chat!
CONTACT SAGE
Send me your thoughts, question, queries or criticisms… email Sage via the contact form or send a voice mail (use the red button, bottom right) on the show website: http://thesagearts.com/contact/
And join Sage on social media:
Instagram https://www.instagram.com/thesageartspodcast/
Facebook https://www.facebook.com/TheSageArtsPodcast
SUPPORT THIS PODCAST
Feel inclined to contribute to the financial support of this project? Buy me a coffee!
https://www.buymeacoffee.com/thesagearts
Or buy a “Feed Your Muse” sticker!
CREDITS:
Cover design by Sage; Illustration by Olga Kostenko
Music by Playsound
Photo on episode cover (Maui jungle/Sage in the Wild) by Ricki Cole
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Transcription (AI transcribed, unedited. Please excuse the copious errors.)
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Your imagination may just be kind of
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weekend listless because it’s feeling starved
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and you actually need to get out of the studio
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and see and experience new and inspiring parts of the world outside your door.
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Hello all my fabulous creative friends.
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Thank you again for joining me on the Sage Arts podcast.
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I’m Sage, your solo host this fine day.
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I am in the studio at the moment, but when this is released,
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I will actually be in Maui,
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hopefully listening to whales and swimming with turtles,
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as well as exploring the backside of the Halaiakala National Park.
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The weather forecast is a little iffy and so it might not be super ideal,
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but you know what?
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I’m going to be out and I’m going to be adventuring
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and that’s kind of the point of today’s conversation,
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which we’ll get into in just a moment.
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That is part of the reason why this episode is going to be a little bit shorter
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because I’m going to get out of town, so I got to get going.
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But variety is good, right?
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So some short ones, some long ones.
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I’m actually really big on variety in my life for a number of reasons.
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Part of the reason actually that I do the little drink thing.
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I like to give you ideas for something else besides whatever your usual drink is.
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So for instance, today my concoction of tea is matcha
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with a little dried raspberry, orange and lemon,
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and then I topped off with a splash of cranberry.
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I know I get a little crazy inventive with my drinks,
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but I like to experiment.
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I like to keep my taste buds tingling.
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I like to keep my senses going, you know?
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I think most people find comfort and familiarity in a routine,
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but I have an unusually strong aversion to it, which drives some people crazy.
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But if you have a cozy comfy routine that you really enjoy, just embrace it.
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But I may suggest that you be careful not to kind of hide behind it.
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Some routine is good.
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It helps us get important things done.
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But in today’s talk, we’ll see why too much routine can be bad for you and for your art.
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So let’s get into that.
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Now routine is only going to be part of this conversation.
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There’s actually a lot of things that go into this particular subject matter
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that I want to talk about.
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The end goal is about feeding your muse.
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But what I primarily want to talk about is having a lot of new and novel experiences.
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And I think if you bear with me through all the preamble,
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you’ll agree by the end that yeah, this is going to be super important for you and for your artwork.
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Now, if you’ve listened to this podcast before, you’ll probably recall that I always end with
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feed your muse, among other things that I say when I’m saying goodbye.
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But I don’t think I’ve fully yet explained why I always say that phrase, feed your muse.
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First, let’s talk about what the muse actually is.
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Officially, it’s a source of inspiration, often a kind of personified spirit.
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Although for some people, the muse they identify with is actually embodied in a real person.
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But in reality, your muse is not a separate entity from you.
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It’s your imagination.
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When we say we are hoping the muse will show up, we are really saying that we hope our imagination
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will come alive and sing and spark and power our creative energy.
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In other words, the muse is a part of our brain, specifically our neocortex and thalamus.
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Not that you probably need to know that unless you’re like a psychologist or whatever.
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But understand it’s embodied in a physical part of us.
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Now, I’m not breaking this down to dispel that sense of magic that many people see and
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love in their creative process.
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Far from it.
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Even if you know the imagination is basically just chemicals and a mass of nerve cells,
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it’s still magic, isn’t it?
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It’s beautiful and it’s an elevating experience.
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So I don’t think that’ll take away from it.
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But to understand why new experiences are so important, you have to recognize that the
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muse is not something outside of yourself that you have no control over.
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Because you do have control over it.
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Your muse is in your mind, in your brain.
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And that organ and those processes actually need to be fed literally and figuratively.
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So in order to feed your muse, you need to first literally feed the brain.
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And if art is a priority, your brain therefore should be a priority too.
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So be good to it.
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That means keeping it healthy and active and engaged.
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Now, I’m not a doctor nor am I a nutritionist, although I have a sister who’s a nutritionist.
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So maybe I’m a little more averse than others.
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So I’m not going to spend a lot of time on the health aspect, but I do want to talk about
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health like nutrition for your brain.
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Now, if you have any particular concerns about your brain health, you know, go speak to a
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doctor because your brain is so important.
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And there are ways to halt or stave off cognitive decline, regardless of why it’s happening,
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just old age or disease or whatnot.
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But you do need to get on that sooner rather than later.
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Now, you can start with simple stuff that doesn’t even take a doctor’s visit to know
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that it’s healthy for you, like minimizing the intake of sugar and processed foods,
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excessive alcohol, fried foods, aspartame in particular, but artificial chemical sweeteners
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in general.
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And then, and you might not know this one, certain types of fish because they’re high
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in mercury, particularly swordfish, mackerel, aji and albacore tuna.
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Mercury can disrupt your neural activities, cause inflammation, which causes things like
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brain fog, depression, fatigue and anxiety.
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And I think it builds up in your system.
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So it’s kind of hard to get rid of.
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Just get to know a little bit more about nutrition and how it affects you and your brain in
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particular.
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And you can talk to a nutritionist or a functional medicine doctor if you want to get more
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information on something that would specifically work for you.
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Other important things, and you’ve heard a lot of this, so just bear with me, a good
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night’s sleep.
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You got to get some sleep.
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You also probably want to meditate or engage in other forms of kind of mental relaxation,
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at least once a day.
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Now you can sing, you can dance or anything that releases your brain from all the thinking
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and the fretting.
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And not so surprising, creating art can be one of those things.
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If you get yourself into the zone and you lose yourself in your creative work, it does
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give your brain a break from those kind of high functioning processes.
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The other thing proven to increase the health of your brain, so your physical brain, not
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just your mind, is to have plenty of new and novel experiences.
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These literally exercise your brain.
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They also release dopamine, which is a primary chemical used by nerve cells in the brain
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to communicate, but also makes you happy.
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It’s what makes you feel good when you’re doing something.
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New experiences also activate the memory centers of your brain.
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So you’re exercising that part in particular.
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So new experiences gets our brain going on building new neural pathways, which is a huge
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part of itself.
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It’s kind of like exercising muscles when you work out.
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It’s been proven that novel experiences are part of a regimen that can slow or halt mental
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decline and people who actively seek out new experiences tend to live longer and happier
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lives.
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So that’s kind of my first selling point for you on novel experiences, that it supports
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your brain health, which supports your imagination, which is a central drive for your art and
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your creativity, right?
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But aside from the brain health aspect, novel experiences are essential for learning and
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continued growth in your art.
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You see, creativity and innovative work is essentially impossible without new experiences
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because our brains have nothing new to pull from and basically they’re out of shape.
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When we do the same things all the time, the brain has a hard time coming up with new
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perspectives because its source for ideas will be dominated by what it’s seeing every
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day and experiencing every day.
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So no change in experience means new ideas are going to be hard to come up with.
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So if your work is feeling a little stale, then you probably need to shake things up
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and not necessarily in the studio.
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Your imagination may just be kind of weak and listless because it’s feeling starved
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and you actually need to get out of the studio and see and experience new and inspiring parts
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of the world outside your door.
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I mean, being out about is where your best memories are usually created, right?
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Just think about your favorite times, even the small moments.
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They probably aren’t you watching a show or updating your social media.
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Chances are that things like trips rank up there pretty high in your best memories.
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Also gatherings of family and friends, art events.
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Even if you’re at an art event to sell and you are mostly in the same place all day,
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it’s still a new experience because of all the new people that you meet and becomes
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very memorable, right?
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Classes can also be highly memorable because we not only learn new things,
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we meet new people and are often in a new location.
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It all feels new and that really wakes up the brain.
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So these kinds of adventures and yeah, I’m going to call these adventures
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because all these outings, all these experiences are a version of adventuring.
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These just can’t be beat by things like being online or watching a show.
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And sure, there’s a lot of great movies out there and great shows and even podcasts
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that can really get you thinking.
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But being out, existing in a new space, talking to people you hadn’t known or expected to meet,
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these are the kind of experiences that really fill up your well.
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And yes, I’m going to mix some metaphors here.
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In fact, I’ll probably go to do it a few times.
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So just bear with me.
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But all these experiences, they fill up your well with lots of emotion and ideas and visuals
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and all kinds of senses.
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All of this is like fuel on the fire for your imagination.
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The other thing that new experiences give you is an opportunity for serendipity to show up.
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Being out at events or gallery openings, for instance, could result in meeting someone
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you collaborate with or find creative support in.
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And that’s actually how I met Dionne Kailer, my guest on episode 12.
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It was at a tiny art gallery in Los Angeles and I really hadn’t wanted to go that night
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because Los Angeles is over an hour away from us.
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And we’d probably spend more time driving than actually being at the gallery and looking around.
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But we hadn’t been out in a while and we pushed ourselves to go and I’m so glad I did.
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I have several great memories from that night and I got back to my studio the next day,
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really jazzed to work on some new stuff.
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And yeah, seeing new art really gets you thinking, right?
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And yes, you can see lots of art online, but being in the presence of it is a very different
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experience because all your senses are activated by the space you’re in.
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Plus, you get a better sense and the full effect of the work’s size, the more realistic colors
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and dimensional textures.
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You also tend to spend more time with the work you see in person versus online, right?
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You know, we’re scrolling through stuff online and we just zip past so much of it,
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even if we really like it.
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I remember seeing fumage or smoke art for the first time in person and I’d seen it online before.
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This is where someone forces smoke from like a candle or an oil lamp across a canvas of some sort
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to create images.
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But this work I was looking at was by an artist whose name I wish I could remember.
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But he used gessoed plywood and it cut out holes and other negative spaces in it.
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And then he had the smoke kind of come in and curl around these edges.
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They’re just creeping out of these negative spaces.
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And it just gave me such a wonderful sense of both destruction and beauty simultaneously.
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And I could actually smell a little bit of the wood.
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I guess it got burnt in the process just faintly, but it was there.
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So I had all these different sensory inputs with this artwork just being there in its presence.
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And I’ll just never forget it.
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And yeah, if I had seen it online, it would have still been cool,
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but it wouldn’t have been anywhere near the experience that I had when I was seeing it in person.
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It’s the same when I first saw a polymer clay show, the colors, the mica shift,
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the variation in texture.
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It just didn’t come across online anything like it did when it was in person.
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So it’s another reason to get out and adventure is to just see and experience art or anything else
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that you love in person because it’s a very different experience than what we do when we’re
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looking at it online.
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It’s the same thing with nature.
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I mean, look at a beautiful picture of a great vista or forest or whatnot is wonderful
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and it’s beautiful, but it’s nothing like being there, right?
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Even if your artwork isn’t focused on nature, hikes and national parks and just drives into
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the wilderness are so good for you.
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It’s so good for your brain, not to mention it’s all an amazing source of inspiration
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that can be full of surprises for you.
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And it’s healthy for your brain in ways you might not expect.
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There’s been studies done about something called forest bathing.
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And if you haven’t heard about it before, you might want to read up on it.
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It’s really interesting.
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Just spending time among trees, particularly evergreens, they release this chemical that
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our bodies actually react to in a positive and relaxing way.
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So studies have found that forest bathing can lower your blood pressure, reduce depression,
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anxiety and anger as well.
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It strengthens the immune system and improves heart and metabolic health.
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These results are likely due to a reduction in stress hormones, which by the way,
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are hormones that interfere with your cognitive activity, you know, the brain again.
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So when you’re out in nature, you’re out in the forest, you are contributing to your brain
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health and thus your muse’s health along with being surrounded by all kinds of potential
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inspiration and new insights.
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And of course, being out in nature, there’s serendipity there too.
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Like a fascinating bird could drop into your path and you just take that image home with you.
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You might come across a stunning pattern or texture you hadn’t even imagined existed before.
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Or you turn a corner and there’s this majestic landscape out in front of you and that image
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will stick with you all the way back to your studio.
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Or if you’re a photographer, probably all the way back in your camera.
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But you don’t know what you’re going to find half the time when you’re out in nature.
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And that’s where new experiences and serendipity really work for you.
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Now, we don’t all have time for regular trips to the mountains or national parks,
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but you can have similar experiences, surprises and inspiration by things near your home.
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Just walk around a neighborhood you haven’t been in before, especially the unusual ones
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are kind of out of the way.
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A lot of them have really interesting architecture or landscape or walk into a strange new store
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like a foreign market or high end boutiques or whatever you don’t usually shop at.
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And for me, I’ll let you in a little secret because it’s kind of funny people laugh at me.
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When I go to a new country, one of the first things I always want to do is go to a grocery
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store or market or wherever they shop for food, because there’s so many foods I’ve probably never
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seen before.
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There’s crazy packaging in some of them, and it’s really interesting to kind of figure out
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what’s important to the culture by how much shelf space they give to particular food.
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So it’s kind of an interesting insight into the place that I’m visiting.
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But in any case, looking around gives me a new outlook on, yeah, food shopping,
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but it’s really interesting.
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And it gets me thinking about things.
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And actually some of that has ended up in my fiction writing.
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So it’s just a strange new place and it gets my brain going.
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Now, cool, strange places are great, but if you can be around new people,
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that is some of the most memorable and energizing of novel experiences.
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Getting to places and events where you can meet new people might seem a bit too time consuming,
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but so is mucking around with your artwork looking for inspiration in a dry well.
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So look for nearby one-off or walk-in classes like yoga or archery or lockpicking if you don’t have a
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lot of time.
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Just look for whatever interests you.
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There’s a lot of crazy things out there.
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And yes, I’ve taken all three of those classes I’ve just mentioned, including lockpicking.
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There’s also low commitment meetup groups and clubs that meet like just once or twice a month
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for an hour or two.
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And you don’t have to go to all of them all the time in order to build friendships and new
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inspiring connections.
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The conversations alone, even if it’s just one time with one person,
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those conversations could change the direction of your work when you’re stuck.
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So if you are not sure what’s out there for you, try brainstorming ideas with family and friends
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and then try to get them to join you because then you’ll be pushed to do new things with them.
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And you also get time with them, which is something a lot of us don’t seem to have enough of
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because yeah, there are a lot of reasons why we might not get out and adventure time being one
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of them.
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We might be too busy.
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We might also have health limitations or energy consuming day jobs, or maybe we just feel lazy.
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Now, if it’s the last thing, if you’re feeling like, oh, I just don’t want to go do anything,
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you got to fight it.
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You got to fight it.
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I’m telling you, get out there and do things.
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You will be so well rewarded.
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If it’s some of the other reasons, we’ll see if you can’t sneak in some of those small things
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that I talked about.
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Let me give you one last not wholly art related reason to seek out novel experiences.
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As you get older, unfortunately, we all tend to have a declining desire to seek out novel
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experiences, in part because our brains have developed these deep grooves in them, these
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routines that I mentioned, they get so well established, it’s hard to get out of that.
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It’s hard to get away from what you just do day in and day out.
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Our brains as we get older, crave safety, security, predictability.
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If you find that you are having a hard time dragging yourself out, getting out and doing
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something adventurous, even when you have the time, it may feel like you’re under a spell or
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something. So let’s just imagine that what’s keeping you from getting out and adventuring
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and getting new and novel experience is some kind of evil anti muse spirit that put a spell on you.
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And in order to break the spell, you have to go out and have fun.
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You just have to fight the heaviness in your feet that inner voice saying no,
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I don’t want to trade my PJs for a nice dress or hiking gear or something.
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The trick really is is to not ask yourself if you feel like going just plan it and go.
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It’s really the same thing as those days when you really don’t feel like doing your artwork,
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but you sit down to the studio table anyways, and you give yourself a few minutes.
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And then next thing you know, it’s gone from a few minutes to a few hours,
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and you’re having a hard time dragging yourself away from the studio table.
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Our brains like to stay in the state that it’s already in.
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So when you don’t feel like doing something, you have a hard time getting motivated,
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just realize it’s the chemistry, it’s your brain trying to keep you safe,
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but it’s not going to feed your muse. And that’s actually kind of what happened
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with this trip I’m going on. I was actually in Maui in November with my husband,
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but I was sick most of the time, so that wasn’t fun.
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Plus, there weren’t whales, and it’s whale season now, and I’ve never seen a whale in person,
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so I’m really excited and hopefully I will get to see them.
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Yet, I’ve had a lot going on and so has Brett, and he didn’t want to go.
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But you know, I realized I need this. The fact is, is I really don’t leave
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my house much since I work from home. I go to the grocery store, go to the post office,
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and most weeks I just don’t get out besides that. So I need to ensure that I’m doing something
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on a regular basis where I’m getting out. So right now we try to get out every weekend,
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even if it’s just going on a hike or going to a museum or whatnot.
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I’m looking for adventurous opportunities because honestly, I feel like the downtime
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when we were in pandemic quarantine and the times afters where we couldn’t travel
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actually kind of weakened my travel bug. And you know, you get used to just being
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home all the time and not having to put that effort into going out, and I was getting
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way too used to it. So I’m fighting that. I’m fighting it big time and I’m going out
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and I’m adventuring and I’m looking for new experiences because I need to fill my well
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with ideas and images, some for you and the podcast, some for my art and photography,
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some for my writing. So that’s what this trip is for, to fill my well.
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And travel is of course one of the really cool ways to get in some novel experiences
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and feed the muse. Travel includes new places, new people, new sights and sounds,
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new smells, new tastes. It’s a whole package experience, right? So if you can get some
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travel in, that’s a really great thing as well. Now, if you can’t, I will share my travels with
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you. You can at least get that. I’ll try and get some reels posted on the podcast, Facebook,
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and Instagram pages, which you can find under the Sage Arts Podcast on both Facebook and
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Instagram platforms. If you have any of your own novel experiences and stories you’d like to share,
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write me and let me know by going to the sagearts.com and using the email form or voice
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message options on the contact page. I’ll share any unique ideas with your fellow listeners
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because the few things I mentioned are by far not a complete list of the things you can do,
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see and experience to energize your brain and get your muse singing.
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Also, if you find this podcast informative, entertaining, inspiring or otherwise feeding
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your muse and you want to give back, you can do so by going to the homepage at the sagearts.com
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and just scroll halfway down to find the buy me a coffee and PayPal donation buttons.
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And I am hoping when I get back, I’ll have feed your muse stickers, which I’d like to offer people
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who donate or sell. I just have to figure out how to do that. But by the time this comes out,
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check the show notes. If there’s a link there for the stickers, then you can go buy them or you can
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just go to the 10th muse arts.com website, which is where I sell the polymer magazine and books I
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produced over the past decade or so. And so yeah, I’ll get any links to those stickers in the show
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notes and you can just check out 10th muse arts.com that’s 10th spelled out T E N T H muse arts.com.
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So with that, I’m just going to say get out adventure, feed that muse, keep your brain
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healthy. And me, I’m going to go grab my bags and head out. So now when I say feed your muse,
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you know what I mean. And take that as a reminder to keep adventuring and having novel experiences.
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Also, stay true to your weirdness and I’ll see you next time on the Sage Arts Podcast.
