Time Management Tuesday: Reading "Boundless Creativity"--Finished!

I finished reading Boundless Creativity: A Spiritual Workbook for Overcoming Self-doubt, Emotional Traps, and Other Creative Blocks by Martha Alderson last week.  I have to say, I found a lot of the spiritual aspects of the book heavy going. There are some more practical elements that did work for me.

In fact, using this book really kick-started a project for me this summer. It got me out of what I call an "overwhelm period."

"Boundless Creativity"'s Practical Takeaways For Gail

Inner Spiritual Goals. I found this helpful, and I hope to stick with using it. My inner, spiritual goal is, by the way, "Finish something." I work to keep this goal in mind especially when I'm exhausted and/or overwhelmed from too many tasks. Finish something. Choose one task that can be completed, even if it's cleaning the kitchen counter, and finish something. Finish something.

Yeah, this is what passes as spiritual for me.

Outer Creativity Goals. I am going to stick with one inner spiritual goal, at least for a while, but outer creativity goals will change with time. Mine for May/June was "Completing a book blueprint for 143 Canterbury Road by mid-June." The system Alderson described for reaching an outer creativity goal, for breaking down the goal into daily objectives/tasks, was very helpful. It could be described as adding a visual element to planning and working. I altered her instructions and, still, I'm actually writing using the blueprint I worked on.

Inspiration For The Future

 

 As a result of reading Boundless Creativity, I

1. hope to do more visual daily objective planning for future projects.  

2. plan to rework a time management strategy I've discussed here in the past with ideas I got from this book. 

3. will try to come up with a way to make finishing projects easier. 

                                                                                                            

 

FTC Disclosure:  I received my copy of Boundless Creativity from a publicist marketing it. 

Time Management Tuesday: Reading "Boundless Creativity" Part III

I've been reading Boundless Creativity: A Spiritual Workbook for Overcoming Self-doubt, Emotional Traps, and Other Creative Blocks by Martha Alderson, because I think creativity--encouraging it and how we use it--can have an impact on how we manage time. I hope so, anyway.


In Week One of my Boundless Creativity blog arc, I wrote about inner spiritual goals and how I've been using one.

In Week Two, I wrote about outer creative goals and how I've been using one.

In Week Three, I'm writing about...

Commitment/Discouragement

 

In Boundless Creativity (and in her earlier book, The Plot Whisperer) Alderson writes a lot about what she calls The Universal Story, a common structure she believes underlies all stories. When she lays it out graphically, it looks like a variation on the traditional plot diagram, though Alderson goes into detail about what she sees happening in each part.

Alderson also suggests that this story structure is part of our lives and our creative projects follow this structure, as well. I can't claim to understand The Universal Story, but I see it as a sort of plot structure (like The Hero's Journey, but not so complicated and mind-numbing). However, this idea of a creative project following a plot structure is very interesting.

For instance, Alderson says that at one point in our own project's Universal Story we will become less excited about what we're doing, begin to doubt ourselves, and not feel we can move forward. If you follow any writer blogs or twitter accounts, you've probably seen people write about the point in a project where the writer knows that what they're doing is crap. (No other word for it.)

The project I've been working on is just an outline. And, at the point I was reading about this discouragement thing in Boundless Creativity, I was also pounding my head against a wall over whether or not I've spent way, way too much time--years, people, years--trying to find the perfect plotting method. Maybe, I was thinking, I should accept myself as an organic writer and stop trying to make lengthy plots before starting to write. Maybe instead of hunting for the plotting secret, I should spend a few years hunting for the organic secret.

Yeah. That was a good idea.

So I spent an hour or two hunting on-line for material on organic writing.

Then I went back to working on my outer creative goal to complete an outline by the middle of June, because I have that inner spiritual goal about finishing one thing.

So that was an interesting experience. What will happen next?

FTC Disclosure:  I received my copy of Boundless Creativity from a publicist marketing it.    

Time Management Tuesday: Reading "Boundless Creativity" Part 2

Last week I began writing about my read of  Boundless Creativity: A Spiritual Workbook for Overcoming Self-doubt, Emotional Traps, and Other Creative Blocks by Martha Alderson. I explained about how her workbook encouraged me to create an inner, spiritual goal--"finish something"-- that I have found helpful the past couple of weeks.

Early on, the workbook asks readers to create an outer creativity goal in addition to the inner spiritual goal. Alderson describes creativity goals as "desires with a plan of action." The one I finally settled on was "Completing a book blueprint for 143 Canterbury Road by mid-June." (A blueprint is sort of an alternative outline for those of us who struggle with outlines.)

What To Do With Your Outer Creativity Goal

Alderson suggests breaking down your outer creativity goal into what we'd call here objectives. (She writes about long-term and short-term goals rather than goals and objectives.) So that's pretty standard. What is different, I think, is that she gives readers a way to assign those objectives/short-term goals a time frame. And there's also something objective-related that is tangible--as in something you can hold in your hand--and manipulate as you work or complete your tasks.

While using this system, I am making progress on what had been a very stalled blueprint/outline.

I will have more on Boundless Creativity in future weeks.

FTC Disclosure:  I received my copy of Boundless Creativity from a publicist marketing it.

Time Management Tuesday: Reading "Boundless Creativity"

You will be delighted, I'm sure, to hear that I am reading a book for us. I’m halfway through Boundless Creativity: A Spiritual Workbook for Overcoming Self-doubt, Emotional Traps, and Other Creative Blocks by Martha Alderson. I was interested in the book because Alderson wrote The Plot Whisperer, which has the best explanation of organic writing I’ve ever seen.


I think Boundless Creativity will be particularly helpful for new writers (or creatives of any type) trying to get started with their work. As in people who are struggling to find time to do personal creative work versus the day job or family work. For instance, so far Alderson is talking a lot about using goal setting to work out a plan for what you're going to do over a specific period of time. You all know how I love goals.

The book has, though, given this more established writer a little jump start for her spring work.

An Inner Spiritual Goal--Finish Something

I have to say that I’m struggling with the spiritual aspects of this book. I sometimes find them distracting. However, there is a section early on about inner spiritual goals that I jumped on.

Alderson describes spiritual goals as "inner goals you decide to address to live your best creative life." Over the course of doing the workbook sections, it came out that spiritually I feel overwhelmed with tasks and that it has a negative impact on my ability to stay focused on any one particular task. I give in to the overwhelm. Yes, that's something I've been talking about here for...ah...probably years.

I was instructed to combine a flaw I'd written about along with a personal strength to create a mantra. Mantras are a spiritual thing that I actually kind of understand. It's a word or saying that's supposed to aid meditation or maybe just in life. The mantra I came up with was "When I am exhausted and overwhelmed from too many tasks, I choose one to complete. One that can be completed."

[EDIT NOTE Dec. 29, 2024: I was wrong in the above paragraph. Mantras involve sound, not meaning. What I actually did was create an affirmation. Which I use to this day. Just used it yesterday, in fact.] 

Or, to put it in a less unwieldy manner, "Finish something."

I tried to deal with the finishing issue a couple of years ago, but, quite honestly, I'm overwhelmed with the amount of time management and productivity material I've picked up since I started this time management feature here at the blog. But now I have this mantra, "Finish something," and that seems to be helping. For the last few days, anyway.

Now by "finish something," I don't necessarily mean writing the next book. Finishing cleaning a counter, the next entry in a trail album, taking care of the clothes piled on a chair, or cooking the eggplant before it goes bad works just fine. Because what I want this mantra to do for me is make me feel less overwhelmed by the multitude of things that go on in life. When I'm not feeling overwhelmed, I can concentrate on work a whole lot better.

Oh, one of the things I finished last week was setting up a private workstation for myself on the main floor of the house. I won't go into the long story of why I needed to do that, but it had been at the back of my mind for a few weeks, if not longer.

Finished.

So for someone who doesn't totally get the spiritual aspects of this book, the spiritual aspects of this book have helped my creativity this past week.

I will have more on Boundless Creativity in future weeks.

FTC Disclosure:  I received my copy of Boundless Creativity from a publicist marketing it.