Cultivating Creativity

Cultivating Creativity

Where does creativity originate? Is it a skill we can sharpen, or an external force we must wait for?

Two of my favorite thinkers on this subject are John Cleese and Elizabeth Gilbert who arrive at a similar conclusion: Creativity is ultimately elusive; it’s not something we can force. Instead, we must cultivate a state of being that welcomes it.

Over the past few years I’ve put this philosophy to the test. Rather than waiting for inspiration to strike, I began experimenting with how to build the right conditions for it to visit.

Below, I’ve compiled six resources and lessons that shifted my perspective on creativity, guiding me away from ‘waiting for the spark’ and toward a practice of actively nurturing a creative state, even when inspiration feels out of reach.

1 Watch Elizabeth Gilbert’s and John Cleese’s Talks on Creativity and Inspiration

Elizabeth Gilbert: Your elusive creative genius | TED Talk

In one of my favorite TED Talks on creative inspiration, Elizabeth Gilbert reframes the artist’s burden by revisiting ancient beliefs on creativity. She notes that the ancients didn’t believe creativity originated solely from within; instead, they viewed it as a divine attendant spirit – a “daemon” or “genius” – that visited. Modernity shifted this, placing the entire weight of creation on the individual, which Gilbert argues is “too much responsibility to put on one fragile, human psyche,” often leading to creative blocks, mental health issues, or paralyzing fear.

Gilbert suggests we return to that old way of thinking. By viewing the “genius” as an external collaborator rather than an internal resource that we must summon, we take the pressure off ourselves to be the sole source of brilliance. Our job is not to force the lightning to strike, but simply to be in an “inspirable” state where the muse visits. And sometimes that’s as simple as showing up and “doing the work” even when you’re not inspired

Key Lessons

• Shift your relationship to inspiration: Stop waiting to feel “inspired” before you start working. Engage in creative work regardless of your baseline state of inspiration and trust that the muse will visit. Your job as a creative is to create the space and mindset to receive inspiration, not require that it be present from within.
• Protect your psyche from the highs and lows: The genius of the ancient model was its ability to protect the artist from their own ego. By externalizing your creativity, you create a psychological buffer: if the work is brilliant, the credit belongs to the muse; if it bombs, the muse was simply absent that day. This prevents you from internalizing failure and keeps you showing up for the next project.

John Cleese’s Legendary 1991 Speech About Creativity

This is an oldie but goodie and if you haven’t seen this yet it’s a must-watch.

Cleese dismantles the myth that creativity is a “talent” some are born with and others lack. Instead, he argues that creativity is a way of operating—a mood we can learn to access. He identifies two distinct modes: the “closed mode,” which is pragmatic, task-focused, and essential for implementation, and the “open mode,” which is relaxed, expansive, and conducive to original thought. The secret, Cleese explains, isn’t just about being creative; it’s about mastering the ability to switch between these modes, and knowing how to steer yourself toward “open” when you need to be inspired.

Key Lessons:

• Creativity is a way of operating, not a talent: Creativity isn’t a fixed trait, it’s a mental state you can cultivate.
• Understand “Open Mode” and “Closed Mode” dualities: Creativity shows up when we’re in “open mode,” a state in which we are receptive, playful, wandering, curious, and without fear or urgency, but we also need “closed mode,” where we are focused, deadline driven, and execution-oriented to get the work done.
• Create your oasis: Give yourself a physical space and a block of time (Cleese suggests 90 minutes) where you are free from interruptions. It takes about 30 minutes just to quiet the brain’s “closed mode” chatter.
• Use humor and play as your switch: Humor is the fastest way to disrupt that tunnel vision and get you back into the open mode. Don’t be afraid to consider the absurd, or play with ideas for no practical purpose.

2 Allow for Boredom

We live in an era where we have successfully eliminated boredom. If we have a spare thirty seconds, we reach for our phones. But by constantly feeding our brains external stimuli, we are effectively cutting off access to our “Default Mode Network” – that state of mind where the brain wanders and makes loose, unexpected associations. When we force our brains to be occupied, we shut down the incubation period creativity needs. Allowing for boredom gives your subconscious the unsupervised time it needs to connect the dots that you can’t see when you’re focused on your to-do list or otherwise entertained.

Put your phone on silent. Do nothing. Try it. This practice isn’t super fun but in our world of constant stimulation, it’s worth carving out some time for boredom. Need some convincing?

Check out these articles:

Boredom and Creativity – Knowledge Without Borders

The Unexpected Value of Boredom for Well-Being and Creativity | Psychology Today

Key Lessons:

• The “Default Mode Network” needs unsupervised time: When we’re bored, our brains aren’t occupied with specific tasks, so we go into a state of daydreaming and mind-wandering. These periods of mental downtime allow our subconscious to make connections between unrelated ideas, often leading to creative insights that wouldn’t come to mind in a more focused, task-driven state.

• Reframing the Void: By resisting the urge to reach for a distraction, you are actively defending your creative real estate. You are choosing to keep the channel open for the random, wild insights that only emerge when your brain finally has nothing to do.

3 Play the Delight Game

I learned about the delight game reading Katherine Price’s, The Power of Fun. The premise of the book perfectly captures a belief I’ve been developing, which is that we can cultivate the things we want to bring into our life – like fun and inspiration –  and not just wait for it to “happen” to us.

The practice is beautifully simple: Find one thing that delights you during the day and share it with a friend. That’s it! The lift is low, but the impact is profound.

First, it changes where you put your attention. Because you know you’re on the hook to share something, your brain switches to hunt mode. You start scanning for things that delight you – the way the breeze feels on your neck, the way the light dapples through the leaves – instead of moving through your day on autopilot.

Second, by virtue of sharing, the reward gets bigger, because your friend delights in your delight, and you delight in theirs.

The Lesson:

Changing your focus changes what you experience. When you consistently look for what is interesting or beautiful, you start to see it everywhere. Inspiration stops being something you’re waiting for, and starts being everywhere.

4 Practice the Art of Noticing

I subscribe to Rob Walker’s substack called the Art of Noticing, where he argues that creativity is actually a set of attention muscles that we have to build. His approach is to create “habits of mind,” as he calls it, through creative prompts. Walker suggests that if you only pay attention to what everyone else is paying attention to, you will never create anything original. To combat this, he provides prompts – like “color walks” or “shape walks” – that help turn a daily commute into an attention exercise. I find that just subscribing to his substack newsletter gives me plenty of prompts for creatively bringing my awareness (my art of noticing) back to the present and what is around me.

In a similar vein, check out Bill Keaggy’s Ted Talk, How to Find Attention, Mindfulness, and Creativity in the Ordinary. Keaggy gives a delightful talk about his habit of finding and collecting lost grocery store lists, and how this practice “opens our eyes to the simple beauty of the everyday… this process [is a] mindful practice, a kind of guerrilla wellness program that takes away life’s stresses and anyone can do it.” His ability to find creative inspiration in the ordinary is beautifully conveyed in his book, Sad Chairs, a coffee table book that whimsically applies meaning and emotion to abandoned chairs.

The Lesson:

Letting our brains get curious, noticing the beauty and the delight in the ordinary, creates a rich environment for inspiration. It allows our minds to start finding inspiration in the small and mundane, in everyday tasks. We don’t have to wait for a lightning bolt from the sky. Inspiration can be found all around us if we cultivate a habit of curiosity and attention.

5 Go for Awe Walks

Dacher Keltner researches awe. His recent book, Awe: The New Science of Everyday Wonder and How It Can Transform Your Life, is described as a field guide for how to place this emotion as a vital force within our lives. I first heard him talk about “awe walks” during his interview  with Krista Tippet on On Being (worth checking out). I loved the idea – that with the right mentality, the right noticing, we can find awe everywhere, if we just look.

The Lesson:

We don’t have to rush off to the grand canyon or the Sistine chapel to find awe, it’s right here under our feet, in the intricate way the moss grows, in the way the light hits the first crocus, in the dappling of sunlight through trees. We just have to look for it.

6 Try a Low-Stakes Daily Practice (like DrawTogether)

When we think about building a “creative habit,” we often imagine carving out hours of uninterrupted time. But illustrator Wendy MacNaughton – the artist behind Samin Nosrat’s Salt, Fat, Acid, Heat – argues that we should be thinking in minutes, not hours. Her DrawTogether community (which you can find on Substack) is a masterclass in lowering the friction of starting.

The structure is simple: for 30 days, she sends a daily prompt that takes ten minutes or less. It’s not about creating a masterpiece; it’s about the practice. By framing these prompts as “exercises” rather than “products,” she effectively silences the inner critic that usually stops us from picking up a pen.

When you remove the pressure to be “good,” you free yourself to be curious. I found that even on the days when I felt least inspired, the tiny, manageable nature of the prompt was enough to get me to sit down. Once I started, the resistance vanished, and I often found myself wanting to keep going.

The Lesson:

When developing a creative habit, sometimes less is more – it’s easy to say yes to 10 minutes. And the best way to overcome our paralyzing inner critic is to value the process, over the outcome.

Conclusion

If these practices have taught me anything, it’s that cultivating a state of inspiration is not about waiting for the perfect moment or hoping for sudden bursts of genius. For me, it’s about creating the right environment: the space to daydream, the permission to play, and the attention to notice the world around us. When we build these habits, we stop chasing creativity and start inviting it in—staying ready, so that whenever the muse decides to visit, we are there to receive her.