Creative Instinct
Have you ever deliberately laid in the grass, looking up at the clouds to find figures or objects hidden within them? I think most of us have done this at some point in our lives. We’ve seen the “angels,” the “Snoopy dog,” the “cross,” and even the “crocodile!” But have you ever seen Benjamin Franklin sitting at his desk with a quill pen in hand? Or Old Macdonald milking his cows? How about John Glenn returning to Earth on Friendship 7? For me, this playful experience speaks to the heart of my creative instincts - vivid, rooted in memories, and driven by a desire to connect across different mediums, no matter how they appear.
The first two photos in this post were black-and-white images of flowers I took and stored on my Mac. I printed them out and then experimented by adding my chosen colors with photographic oils. They closely reflect what I saw through my camera lens, yet there’s a depth and authenticity to them that I could never capture directly. If I’m ever to become the “maker” I aspire to be, I have to tap into my creative instinct regularly, embracing whatever I end up creating along the way.
The next image started as another black-and-white photo. This time, I used watercolor pencils to add color, then photographed it again and imported it into the Procreate app on my iPad Pro, applying a painterly filter. The result reminded me of the black-and-white images I’d experimented with using oils. Another moment of following my creative instinct - or perhaps, that “gut feeling” - and trusting it would yield what I envisioned.
I’ve often said the best way for me to come up with an idea is not to think about it. What consistently works is to sit quietly and let my instincts take over. Some days, I feel like the camera, the pen, and the paintbrush all rolled into one. In those moments, I find myself in the “Zone,” and the more I visit this space, the better it feels and the more integral it becomes to who I am.
Now, everything I create becomes part of my “stash.” It doesn’t go to the trash anymore. I’m learning to appreciate my mistakes, treating them as stepping stones in a much bigger process. We can train our instincts to work with us rather than run from them. As humans, we carry our experiences along the way, and they evolve with the changes happening around us. That alone makes us instinctively creative.
“A creative life is an amplified life. It’s a bigger life, a happier life, and expanded life, and a hell of a lot more interesting life.”
Elizabeth Gilbert
So, the next time you’re lying in the grass, staring up at the sky, look beyond Snoopy and the angels and wait just a bit longer. Do you see him? That’s Mario Andretti crossing the finish line in his Brawner Hawk III!
Talk soon…
G