• great creative tip: No 346

{ We've been discussing clearing out those rooms full of stuff—garages, "guest room", storage units, basements, attics, closets—and simplifying, more or less. } 

But there's one "room" that we have not dealt with, yet. It is a place that is full of valuable possessions we all have, but that we all seem to overlook. If we could just get in there and access all that stuff, grand creative projects could be planned, started, finished, and released for all to enjoy.

Instead we keep it locked up to be "worked on" at a later date. I'll get around to it...someday. Can't work on that now. Really don't have time.

If it is all shut away in that little room you are right about all those excuses. Today that changes. Today we go into that smallest room in our lives that contains some of our biggest dreams, hopes, and ideas.

This room is in our mind. We've kept it closed and locked for fear we might start and fail. Some fear of starting and SUCCEEDING! Really. Then what would you do?

If you are a regular visitor here to the TEA BLOG, you know I carry a sketchbook everywhere I go, everyday—even on late night trips to the grocery store. I have been carrying a sketchbook, sketch pad for much of my life.

Lots of the pages are filled with scribbled words: seminar notes, to do lists, words that later became books or magazine articles. And...there are lots of cartoons and other drawings.

 If I get a thought, an idea, a reaction to a sermon or seminar I'm listening to, I WRITE IT DOWN. I will NOT remember it.  

In  the front of every one of my 140 plus sketchbooks is the now-famous phrase, "Anything worth remembering is worth writing down." (Example from one of my sketchbooks, right. Click to enlarge.)

What's in that little room in your head that needs to get out? Putting it in a simple sketchpad gets into your life in a more active way. You'll run across it as you flip through the messy, exuberant, delight-full, color-full pages in your pad.

Once again I will suggest that if you are new to the valuable "habit" of carrying a "sketchbook", let your first one be a simple, not too big, inexpensive pad of unlined paper. (The little book in the photo on the left, below, looks like one of those nice, expensive Moleskine brand books from Italy. It is not. It is a far cheaper knock-off (by Hand•Book Journal Company), but also with thick, textured, "water-color" paper. I purchased it—on sale—at Hobby Lobby for about 30% of the cost of a similar Moleskine book. I do not own ANY Moleskine books.)

Buying tip: Get something that you will...

• Use fffffrequently (everyday)

• Carry everywhere—not just trips to your favorite coffee hut to sit and dream (but especially there)

• Not be afraid to scribble in, pant in, spill coffee, TEA, wine, milk, or anything on (often intentionally)

Buy your first one at Target, Walmart, Hobby Lobby (great weekly specials, check Sunday paper and website for coupon), or your local drug store. Make the contents special, not the book. You can also find lots of good, cheap, basic doodling supplies (felt pens, portable watercolor sets, etc.) at Target and the rest.

Do not be afraid being messy, silly, incomplete...and do not tear out any pages. It is important to include the frustrated, half-finished, ugly, nothing' stuff. Remember this is replacing that dark little room in your head.

This is not a diary, though it will have a journal quality as you add to it daily and even paste into it the occasional movie ticket (with quickly scrawled review), paper chopstick wrapper, snapshot, postcard or other memento that might otherwise be tossed or lost.

No one but you needs to see this—your book, your choice.

{ As for the word sketchbook. Let's check the dictionary.}

sketch |ske ch |
noun
1. a rough or unfinished drawing or painting, often made to assist in making a more finished picture : a charcoal sketch.
• a brief written or spoken account or description of someone or something, giving only basic details : a biographical sketch of Ernest Hemingway.
• a rough or unfinished version of any creative work.

Tools Needed

• Small sketchbook with UN-lined paper (see "Buying Tip" above)

• Pencil, fountain pen, favorite scribbling & doodling devices

• Whatever you can think of, put it in the book, don't keep filling that storage room in your mind: scribble, doodle (penmanship and spelling do not matter.) This is your place to get ideas, thoughts, and projects out into the open.

Best time to start clearing you mind would be...ah...TODAY.

Comments

[Renee]

That is probably the greatest thing I have read in a long time. THANK YOU for reminding me it is ok to be random. :) God cares about my thoughts, so I should care enough to dissect them once in awhile too.

[Brad]

Working on clearing it out. Then, to do something with it once it's out! Thanks McNair.

[Tammie Fickas]

Carrying a book is one of the first things you learn in the Apprentice program through the Christian Writers Guild and one of the things I had had the hardest time getting myself to do. But, I know have a cute pink book and in the front I have written your quote.

Off to write down some rememberings!
Tammie
www.tamaradfickas.blogspot.com

[Kim Ykema]

I carry a luscious bag of creativity with me almost everywhere I go (after reading your ACC posts). The other day I whiled away a very long wait at a medical office, busily sketching away while my husband bored himself with magazines. The receptionist was highly entertained by my enthusiasm. Must confess, though, as I waited for Mother's Day breakfast at a busy restaurant, I wasn't courageous enough to pull out the sketch pad and pencils while wedged between animated strangers. Maybe next time I'll be brave enough... and willing to talk about my creativity with any curious onlookers.

[Francine Phillips]

In the old comedy TV days, they called the comedy routines a "sketch" too - many unforgettable, like Carol Burnett's drapery-rod shoulders in the Gone With the Wind spoof. Brilliant stuff in those "sketches."

[Alex Mitchell]

I have started taking a little sketchbook with me in my backpack when I go to the indoor pool in my neighborhood. I realized that my pool break which includes a 15 minute walk to get there has become a brainstorming time for me. I guess getting out of the studio and changing scenery is enough to give me new ideas. The funny thing is, and this is why I thought of sharing this, that I end up writing for about 20 minutes in the locker room before I even change into my bathing suit. The ladies coming and going through the locker room see me scribbling away and don't say anything, but I'm sure it looks quite odd to them. I just smile at everybody and try to get all my thoughts down. Then I get in the water and do my laps just as happy as can be.

[Anna Merrell]

Half way through reading your post, tears start to well in my eyes... An unusual response, I'm sure.

The vast amount of people that are alive and have lived before us with their own thoughts and ideas overwhelms me. How could any of us be truly unique and have something new or worthwhile to add to an abundant supply of already recorded thought? I have the hardest time valuing my own thoughts... even to the point where I question other people that value theirs. And I know it's wrong... I know that's a lie. A big lie that I fall hard for. Why? What's worse is that my husband, a huge fan of yours, dreams big dreams -- and I struggle to support him by valuing his visions.

I also know the entirely huge brain that God has blessed me with. It's bubbling with thoughts and ideas, waiting for me to stop gagging it. Any thoughts on how to begin to value my self and my thoughts and ideas and dreams? Perhaps just letting them come out in a sketch journal is enough...

Appreciate it-