The beautiful thing about summer is the relief from the wheel of educational life. Students love summer because they get their temporary freedom from school. Unfortunately, I do not really get summer vacations anymore because I am writing year round. Jesus be a graduation. Because my mind is always on being productive on my diss, I find that my creativity takes a severe hit, often having no energy to daydream or write fun things like poetry. To be an artistic soul that does not have room to really create is downright depressing and keeps me from being productive on school things. It reflects an imbalance of work and play that is a necessity. Realizing this, I wanted to tend to my creative side this summer and stretch those artistic muscles.
Being a full-time student has made me more and more of a tortured artist, but also but a bit of a stunt on my creative growth. Both of my parents are artists. Between them, they’ve dabbled in music, dance, writing, painting, sculpture, and photography. So have I. Without even looking at any studies or data, I know that when I create, I am happier. I feel more readily accomplished when I write a piece of poetry or take photos. Cleaning up a painting with music, dancing in general all put me at ease. Because of this, I wanted to make a few goals for the summer
1.) Social Media Detox– Periodically I go ghost on social media for a week, two weeks, a month to just reset my mental. Social media can be so damaging, and I was feeling drained by trying to keep up with the posting and taking in too much of other people’s lives. So yep. It is time to reset.
2.) Creative’s Journal– As an exercise in making sure that I am letting my artistic side flourish. In it, I have my summer journal entries, goals, poems, vision boards for various things, and sketches.
3.) Photo Challenge– To focus on my photography skills I’ve been carrying my Canon M50 around and finding something to inspire me (almost) every day. I plan to share these in July on my photo IG (@shardechapman)
4.) Searching for God– I have not been as disciplined as I’d like in my devotional practice. With a bit more time to structure my day more around going more in-depth with my prayers and meditation. I hope out of it to find a bit more clarity on what my next moves should be
5.) Take road trips– This too, is going to help me be more inspired. Now that I have air, I plan to make some cheap trips to other Texas cities and explore. This is the best way to allow yourself some new air without spending as much. No car? Try Megabus. It is a cheap way to travel. When I lived in Richmond, I always took the Megabus to DC and Baltimore to visit family and friends.
What do you say? Is a season devoted to creativity necessary?
Love and Light,
~S
Shardé Searches 