Inspiration
Inspiration is the place where everything ever made begins. Design and motif makers can get started here.
— inspiration —
Everything ever made starts with inspiration
Joy
— Let Joy guide your creating and it will reciprocate ten fold. —
Time
— Remember that time you treated yourself and it felt so good? Schedule that into your day, week and month and watch your dream life develop. —
Focus
— Your natural senses will provide all the focus you need. Discover techniques to get them working for you while you do what you love. —
Joy - the Ultimate Muse
Ask yourself often, Does this bring me joy?
When I’m creating a pattern I repeatedly ask myself if this brings me joy. Not, do I like it, but does it bring me joy. For me, this is a visceral exercise. I’m taking stock of whether I feel joy rather than engaging my mind or preferences. I’m looking for an experience or an internal response. This is how I seek joy as my muse.
The way this works for me is I sit with my creation or my vision of my next project and discern how it makes me feel. If I have to convince myself to do it, it probably isn’t bringing me joy and I will likely not be creating something I love or something others love. It took me a minute to learn this, but now it saves me so much time during my process. Sometimes I will feel within the first half-hour of creating that this is not motivated by joy and I’ll scrap it before I waste hours trying to make it work.
You’ll know when it is right when you find yourself gazing at your work repeatedly just so you can experience that feeling again. I knew when I chose the right wedding dress because I didn’t want to take it off. It was joy that kept me looking at myself in the three-way mirror with the perfect dress on. The same is true of work I know is complete. Once I finish a pattern and share it on social media or to a trusted work friend, if I find myself going back to look at it, I know that this is a perfect fit for me. It brings me joy again and again to see this work I created.
Time
Scheduling time to center yourself is as important as your work schedule or other appointments. After I had my stroke I wasn’t physically able to do all the things I used to do. I spent a lot of time either sitting or doing physical therapy. I couldn’t handle computer work and my creativity was flatlining.
Color me focused
Whether you start with color or add color at the end, a defined palette is a style technique all its own.
