A 30 day personal creative challenge.

Day 1. Red door and stained glass at Edgefield Baptist Church in Nashville. I'm always drawn to a red door and the stained glass is so pretty. This church also has rich history. It was one of the very few structures to survive the Great East Nashville Fire of 1916. Though heavily damaged, parishioners saved it and two other churches through hand to hand bucket brigades. The inspiration is as much about beauty as it is about resilience and gratitude.

 The creative challenge:  

Take a picture of something pretty or inspiring every day for 30 days and post it to instagram.  That simple.

Why?

To fuel creative energy of course!

A creative challenge isn't my original idea.  I've read variations on this theme before.  Once I read an idea about texting a picture of something representative of your day, to keep in touch with a friend who's moved to another city or state.  The idea was to communicate every day in a way that was meaningful instead of letting weeks pass by because you didn't have time to write a long email.  One of my closest friends moved far away a few years ago and we tried this for a while.  It's not a perfect system...sometimes all we could think to send was a picture of morning coffee or evening beer or a messy desk at work.  And yet, it was communication and we were giving each other at least a glimpse of what we were doing.  It's the same effect of having meaningful conversation for a few minutes everyday, or most days, with your child's teacher or an employee or neighbor, and seeing that the communication over time becomes far more meaningful than if you have a lengthy conversation every month or two.

My thinking behind this challenge is to continue to look for ways to keep the creative brain active, even when a hectic work schedule or routine chores are in charge of my day.  Often I get to the end of Friday and feel estranged from things of beauty and creative energy...argh!  Taking a quick picture of something in the world that is beautiful or inspires me I hope will be kind of like setting an intention at the beginning of yoga...something I can go back to when my experience-in-that-particular-moment is anything but beautiful or inspirational.  And, maybe, some of those pictures will be the basis for a cool jewelry design or upcycling project...



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Here is the link to my instagram feed if you want to see how I do.  Join me?  Post your pictures of beauty and inspiration in the comment section or in your own instagram feed, but don't forget to post a link to it in the comment section of this post!

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