How to be an artist and not go insane

Let's be honest here. At one point or another you, as an artist/creative person, have thought that you must have lost it. I have entire, endless oceans inside my head. (Hence the name of my blog.) There are really, really messed up, adorable, wonderful and totally fictional characters that I hang out with on a daily basis. I have plot lines, setting descriptions and random story ideas bouncing against the inside of my brain and I can rarely watch a movie without ticking an imaginary checklist of things like: character arcs, world building, backstory, climax, resolution, inciting incident, etc. etc.

And that can be a little bit scary. 



I am assuming that I am not the only one out there who thinks somedays that I should really just move to Wonderland already and save everyone the trouble of picking out a nice asylum for me to go to. 

While I'm not saying I've got it all figured out (my goodness, I've still got a long ways to go), I have figured out a few ways to lessen the "insanity" (which, as I have figured out, is just bent up creativity). 


1) Unleash your creativity. This one may seem a bit obvious, but seriously. Unleash your creativity. Those characters inside your head are probably not going away any time soon, and the only way you can get the children to shut up is to write their stories down. Write that book. Sing that song, paint that painting, create that poster, dance that dance. Set the creative monster free!

2) Talk to other creative people. Seriously, creative people are so much fun to talk to. I just reached out to other writers in the past year, and man, has it been awesome. I went from someone who had to ruminate on books and stories and characters and etc. etc. by myself to being able to talk to people who got it. That was pretty spectacular. Sometimes I'll comment about a character or stereotypes on a blog and discussions follow, then I get to sit back and ask if that really just happened. Like, did we just discuss the hidden symbolism in the font of this new book? (I actually haven't had that conversation, FYI.) Non-creative people don't really care, so it's awesome to connect with people who understand. (So a huge shout-out to the blogging community here!)

3) Embrace the creative monster within. Being creative may seen a bit weird to other people, but that's ok. If you're creative, own it! Shout it from the rooftops! Put it on a billboard! Carve your face into the surface of the moon! (Or maybe not.)


How do you not go insane with all your bottled up creativity? Let me know in the comments!

Comments

  1. These are all things that I've been starting to learn only recently. I have a really close friend and critique partner now that I talk to about all my story ideas and I've felt my own writing strengths growing just knowing I have the support.

    *insane laugh* What makes you think I'm not crazy? Seriously though, I have so many ideas and characters and settings and everything knocking around in my head that it would get way too crowded if I didn't binge write in November, and even now I still have seven cajillion ideas that want to be worked on. So no, sane isn't really an option for me. :P

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    1. Yeah, me too. I used to think that it was just a hobby, but I've realized now that I get pretty miserable if I neglect my writing. That's awesome! Writing support is so awesome.

      Hahaha :) it gets crowded, doesn't it? The children just won't shut up unless I write about them. Besides, the best people usually are mad, to quote Lewis Carroll.

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  2. Ha, yes, I totally get you!

    Friend/parent/whoever: "That was quite a good film."
    Me: "Ah yes and I really liked the carried motif from scene 3 to scene 7 and also the subversion of the genre trope and the symbolism of the colour green--"
    Friend/parent/whoever: "...."

    So blogging is AWESOME!

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    1. OH MY GOODNESS YES!!!! I do that all the time and I'm afraid I'm going to get stuff thrown at me if I don't stop. Like seriously, how do they miss the fantastic/sucky character development and the painfully obvious/well done plot structures of the different genres? I don't think I could go back to not blogging because I'd have no one to discuss this stuff with. I adore the blogging community. On that note, thanks for commenting!

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  3. I have to agree that talking to others is a great way to exercise my creativity. Bouncing ideas off of people is a great way to brainstorm and clear up what you're thinking about, so I am always grateful for the people I can talk to about whatever I'm working on. :)

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    1. I totally understand you. Just saying stuff out loud helps to clear the muddled thoughts up. I'm super glad you have people you can talk to about your work!

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