If you’ve come up against a creative block, these tips on building a creative space will help you find your inspiration again.
1. Comfort is Key
When your body is comfortable and relaxed, your mind can roam free! The little things, like sitting in a comfortable chair, enable your mind to concentrate on the truly important things rather than the fact that you hate sitting in a chair. This frees your thoughts from the impervious frustrations of daily life so that you can unwind and let your creative juices flow.
2. Fill the Space with Inspiration
By stimulating your senses, you never know which thoughts will burst into consciousness. Nobody likes a boring, lifeless space filled with straight lines and emptiness. The world we live in flourishes in COLOR! We are a product of our environment, so situating yourself in a place where randomness and inspiration run will also open up your thoughts to new possibilities. You can find inspiration through art, music, flowers, etc.
3. Change it Up
It’s all about location, location, location! Sitting in the same room day after day, accomplishing the same tasks every time, amounts to a sense of sustained normality. Make sure your comfort does not turn into a negative influence. When you are comfortable with the way things are, then there is no motivation for innovation or change. By moving around the office, or working outside for a day, you allow for the fresh break and change your body craves to be stimulated.
4. Personalize Everything
Personalize your space with everything that makes you, you! By adding family photos, things you’ve collected, and even painting the entire office, you’ll be able to turn a workspace into something that makes you feel at home. This allows for a greater sense of familiarity, which leads to a sense of relaxation, thus allowing free-form thought.
5. Lighting is Vital
Ambiance of a room sets the tone of the room. Although lighting is not something most people think about, it actually makes a huge difference in what will get accomplished. If it is bright and fully lit, then it creates an energizing vibe. Whereas if there are dim lights, it could send a more relaxed vibe. If you need to make a hard deadline, then sitting in a soft lit room with soft music is not conducive to productivity. If you need time to process an idea, then that sort of lighting would be perfect. Matching lighting to the goal is imperative for success.
6. Idea Centers
Having a physical area where you can pin ideas is another tool that helps to inspire creativity. By using whiteboards, bulletin boards, and idea books, you have a reference anytime you hit a mental roadblock. Using technologies such as Pinterest for storing ideas/inspiration is great, but it is crucial to have something that is tactile and immediately available upon sight.
7. Brain Food
Yummy snacks, coffee, luxurious chocolates are all delicious things you need to power your mind! When your stomach runs out of energy to burn, your mind runs out of fuel to use. When it becomes so hard to concentrate on basic tasks because you’ve hit that physically empty point, then it becomes almost impossible to come up with new creative ideas. Having the right fuel and knowing when you need a break are a huge component to greater creativity and productivity.
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