In a world brimming with hustle and bustle, daily routines, and digital notifications, we often neglect an essential facet of our humanity—our ability to express creatively. Beneath the surface of our everyday lives lies a vast reservoir of feelings, memories, and ideas yearning for a release. Creative expression, an innate capacity that transcends age, profession, and background, serves as a bridge connecting our innermost thoughts with the tangible world. Whether through the mesmerizing tunes of music, the enchanting strokes of art, or the captivating rhythm of words, there's an artist within each of us waiting to be discovered.
What is Creative Expression?
Creative expression is the ability to understand and express personal emotions outwardly. By combining our imagination and our emotions, creative expression helps individuals find a better outlook on their past experiences, trauma, and other roadblocks in their self-awareness journey. There are countless ways to express ourselves creatively, whether through music, visual art, crafting, writing, photography, drama, or movement. We are going to focus on music, art, and writing in today’s article.
What If I Don’t Feel Creative?
Most of us know that letting children play and express themselves is important for their development, not just physically and emotionally, but also socially and intellectually. However, creative expression isn’t just for kids and it’s not just for ‘creative types’, either. Whether you consider yourself creative or not, there’s a bit of it in all of us.
How to Practice Creative Expression
Expression Through Music - Musical expression is the art of playing or singing with a personal response to the music. At a practical level, this means making appropriate use of dynamics, phrasing, timbre and articulation to bring the music to life. (What I find — and I think most of us find — beautiful about music is its ability to draw us in, to evoke emotion and take our thoughts and minds to a higher plane.)
Expression Through Art -
Keep in touch with how you feel. What is the emotion that's coming up for you?
Close your eyes and ask: if this feeling had a color, shape, form, weight, temperature, texture, what would it be like?
Depict that on paper, using colors, shapes, and lines.
Expression Through Writing - The practice of expressive writing generally involves spending 15-20 minutes a day for 3-5 consecutive days (or longer) writing about one's deepest feelings and emotions related to an event or interaction they have had. Individuals may write about the same issue or focus on a different topic each day.
How Will Creative Expression Help Me?
#1 Creative Expression improves your mood - When you finish a creative task, like writing in a journal, singing a song or drawing a cute dog, your brain is filled with dopamine – an all-natural antidepressant that motivates you and makes you feel good. Dopamine is a type of neurotransmitter. Your body makes it, and your nervous system uses it to send messages between nerve cells. That's why it's sometimes called a chemical messenger. Dopamine plays a role in how we feel pleasure. It's a big part of our unique human ability to think and plan. It helps us strive, focus, and find things interesting.
#2 Creative Expression boosts your self-esteem - It feels pretty good to be creative. There’s nothing better than that moment of personal satisfaction when you’re finished - not to mention the sense of achievement you get from creating something out of nothing. If you keep on creating over a longer period of time, you’re probably going to get better at it. And as you start to notice your progress, you’re bound to notice a confidence boost, too.
#3 Creative Expression improves cognitive function - when we’re creative, we use parts of the brain that aren’t usually in action for everyday tasks.
#4 Creative Expression alleviates stress and anxiety - You might have noticed that adult coloring-in books are a thing now.That’s because they help you find your flow – the state where you’re so absorbed in an activity that you forget all the worrying thoughts lingering in your mind. It’s impossible to be stressed or anxious when you’re completely and utterly in the moment, distracted by a captivating novel, cake recipe or art project.
More Ways To Be Creative
Acting
Baking
Carpentry
Calligraphy
Dancing
Embroidery
Flower arranging and fashion design
Gardening
Illustration and interior design
Jewelry making
Knitting
Landscape design
Needlework
Photography
Poetry
Quilt making
Reading
Singing
Storytelling
Scrapbooking
Theater
Videography
Woodwork
Yoga
Click the link below to get some free coloring book pages
Gotta love Ted Talks!
As we've journeyed through the realms of music, art, and writing, it's evident that the act of creative expression is not just an artistic endeavor—it's a deeply human one. Through such expression, we not only find avenues to articulate our emotions but also understand ourselves better. The process of creating something, be it a melody, a painting, or a piece of writing, is akin to a therapeutic ritual. It has the power to heal, inspire, and transform. And in a world that sometimes feels overwhelming, turning to creative outlets offers solace, a sense of purpose, and a reconnection with our true selves.
Don't let the myths of talent or inborn creativity hold you back. Start small. Pick up a pencil and sketch, write a four-line poem, or hum a tune. Visit the provided links for coloring pages and watch the TED talk to further immerse yourself in the magic of creativity. Remember, every masterpiece begins with a single stroke, a solitary note, or a lone word. Unveil the artist within you, and let the world revel in your unique creative brilliance.
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