Blogging is hard. Hell, life is hard. And sometimes when things get difficult, you can be put into a sort of crazy weird funk that seems never ending.
Recently, I’ve been in a bit of a funk. I’m sure any creator in the world has had these days where you just don’t know what to write, edit, shoot, or even just do with your life. While I have been working non-stop at my current full time job, my blog and YouTube channel have just been sitting idly by almost collecting dust.
I think about my blog and brand every single day, yet I can’t seem to get anything done. And my ‘funk’ seems to keep going day after day after day. And it, for the lack of a better word, sucks.
But I’ve slowly started to come out my funk, day by day by doing certain things to help ease my mind, body and soul (sounds cheesy, I know). And so today I want to share with you my little secrets of what helps me to slowly, but surely, get out of these ‘creative funks’ I tend to easily get myself into. While, they really aren’t secrets to the all-knowing future, I like to think these 5 tips will hopefully spark that sparkler of creativity in your mind as it is slowly doing for me now.
Here it is, my TOP 5 WAYS TO GET OUT OF A ‘CREATIVE FUNK’
Listen to Music
And that could mean going to a free concert at the park, driving around town listening to the radio with your windows rolled down (or in my case in Arizona, windows up with ac blasting), or just listening to your songs that you have on Pandora, Spotify or Itunes.
I personally love listening to my Itunes on shuffle because it takes me back to songs I haven’t heard in years, but obviously liked enough to have downloaded it on to my playlist, and really just jam out. Sometimes jamming out can really bring some creativity to the surface.
I’ve had times where old pop alternative punk songs like Relient K, Boys Like Girls or We the Kings come on and it reminds me of times when I was in middle school listening to these songs and writing Harry Potter Fan Fiction on a site that was once called Quizilla and how dedicated I was to writing these mini series to random people on the internet. That alone pumps me up enough to get out of that creative funk and really start writing blog ideas or just start writing in general. Which brings me to my next tip…
Write
And I don’t mean write a blog post or a pitch idea. I mean brain dump hand-write in a journal style of writing.
Okay, so you don’t actually have to hand write if that’s not your thing, but to me writing and just brain dumping all the thoughts in my head into a journal really helps clear my mind of a bunch of useless stuff and really helps me get to the real creative things and put them into the light.
I mean as much as I find Max Minghella from The Handmaid’s Tale a very beautiful human being, he’s not exactly something I can write about on my blog or make a video about. (Granted if you’re in a different niche where you can write about him, please do.) But if he runs around in my head for too long, it will distract me from the real creativity that is deep in my brain.
So I brain dump his hotness level in my journal and voila it’s out of my head and my real creative writing pops into the clear and I’ve got some blog post ideas to write about for my particular brand and blog.
Exercise
Yes, I hate exercising as much as the next person, but I also love it too. It’s honestly a love/hate relationship with exercising.
One day I like feeling like superwoman on the treadmill running a mile in 8 minutes to the next day eating pizza on the couch while watching Friends.
But exercise can help with bringing you out of any funk you currently have whether it’s in the creative field, work, home, etc. Exercising can really do wonders to you.
And it doesn’t really matter what exercise, just do something active. It will clear your brain, you will feel amazing afterwards, and you can later say ‘I can treat myself to this ice cream cone because I exercised today’ I mean that alone will help my creative juice ooze out of me.
Read
I love reading books. Sometimes I have no time to read books and other times I can read an 800 page book in one night.
And I like reading fictional novels more than anything else. I’m the weirdo who has book crushes and cries when someone dies in a book. Like right now I’m reading King’s Cage by Victoria Aveyard, loved her first book Red Queen so just reading her third installment really helps me get creative.
And so with all the reading comes a lot of inspiration. And with inspiration comes those creative juices.
And I don’t just love reading fictional novels, I also love reading blogs. Blogs are truly a huge inspiration and there are so many of them online you can never get bored or run out of reading material.
So if you’re not a huge book reader, I’d definitely recommend starting out with some blogs to get some inspiration from because I know once I read some of my favorite blogs it makes me want to jump right back in blogging almost immediately.
Disconnect & Explore
Yes, I mean turn off your phone, completely off. And just go outside and explore a little.
It doesn’t have to be for a long time, but at least long enough to be able to clear your mind from all distractions in your life. Take this time of disconnect to explore a new place without snapchatting it, even if it’s just the park a block away.
Sit in the grass and enjoy the sweet breeze of fresh air. Get in your exercise by taking a walk and just really clearing your thoughts and enjoying life.
Then once you have a clear mind, come back to your office or home and get stuff done. Clearing my mind really helps with my productivity and creativity because once I get back to a project after a disconnect break I feel so clear headed that sometimes I just start working for hours without realizing it and I get a lot done.
That’s my list of tips to try and get out of that creative funk. I know it might not be the secrets of the unknown and fairly simple tips, but sometimes you just need a reminder that these type of things will help you and really bring you back to life.
I know these have really helped me get out of my creative funk and now I’m ready to rock and roll!
Do you guys have any tips or tricks that help you get out of your creative funk? Comment them below, I’d love to hear them!
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