How to Encourage Your Photographic Creativity

Being creative or simply having the ability to create on demand is one of the biggest assets you can have in this era. The question is "how do we unlock or keep creativity flowing?"  The main steps you need to keep in mind are simple.

1. Encourage creativity.

2. Train your brain to be more creative.

Exercising your mind on both these steps can keep it flowing with creativity.

Encourage your creativity, and you'll increase your creativity. Of course, this is true of most things you want to see more of in your life.  Encouragement can work wonders, but how do you encourage creativity?

Start by paying attention to it. Our subconscious mind tends to give us more of what we pay attention to. Ignore the creative aspects of your life, and you are telling your subconscious that they are unimportant. Consciously note when you’re creative, and your subconscious mind will start feeding you more creative ideas. Just look for it, and you’ll find more of it.

Put it on paper.

You can encourage creativity by writing your ideas down. Start keeping an idea journal. Do this regularly, and you’ll notice that you often start having more ideas the moment you start to write. A so-so idea may normally be forgotten, but by writing it down, you may remember it. Then, your subconscious can work on it and may transform it into something very creative.

Spice it up.

For more creativity in your life, start putting creative ideas into practice. If you paint, paint something totally different from your usual subjects. If you sell houses, try a new approach. Even just driving a different route to work to see if it is quicker can encourage your creativity. Just get your mind working outside of its regular patterns. 

Travel.

Changing your surroundings can encourage creativity. If you normally photograph in a studio, try photographing outside — like industrial complex or maybe an abandoned shack (do it in a legal manner). If you write, try sitting on a roof to write. For new ideas for your business, take a notebook to the park, and sit by the duck pond. Any change of environment can get your brain out of its creative rut.

Work on creativity training.

To dramatically increase your creativity, develop creative habits of mind. If you watch a good comedian, you’ll see that she has trained her mind to look for the “different angle” on everyday things. Why not train your mind to do the same?

These two techniques are called “assumption challenging” and “random presentation” and are classic creative problem solving techniques. There are dozens more. If you train your brain to habitually use these or other techniques and provide it with a little encouragement, you really can have more creativity.