Your Job is to Stay Inspired

Photo by Sophiea

The ini­tial rush of inspi­ra­tion is mag­i­cal. Divine.  It comes with such power. That first idea is a where the but­ter­fly has finally built the momen­tum to come out of the ever tight­en­ing cocoon.  We breathe in the light of a new day cre­ated by the awe­some rum­blings of our cre­ative engine. It just feels so damn good.

We dive in. Whole body…whole being into the process. And it’s fun. Until we step into that first shadow, where the road ahead is sud­denly obscured. We haven’t cre­ated the next step and we worry that won’t know where it is.  Mov­ing for­ward had been so effort­less and now it feels like an impossibility.

The pixie dust of inspi­ra­tion has faded…it filled our engines so per­fectly that we fig­ured that it would be there all along. That it would carry us safely towards the fin­ish line…basically that we could rock it to the end with­out any main­te­nance.  And we dis­cover along the way that it sim­ply ain’t true.

But we don’t have to peter out…or hit the blocks and sim­ply turn around with our imag­i­nary puppy dog tail between our legs. We just have to fig­ure out how to stay inspired. Inspi­ra­tion is every­thing it feels like in the begin­ning. What we often have wrong is that it will stay around for ever and ever with­out hav­ing to do any­thing to stoke the fires.

Inspi­ra­tion is a respon­si­bil­ity. Our respon­si­bil­ity.  We must play with our muses. Fill our own tanks.  And con­tinue to do so…pretty much for ever.  Or at least for as long as we want to remain inspired.

It is a con­scious prac­tice, akin to a spir­i­tual one.  I make sure that I indulge in that which get my mind fired up and my heart sparkling sev­eral times per week.  It is what keeps me rock­ing.  Any­one who knows me, knows I am super pro­duc­tive.  I do a lot of stuff in a day. I love every lit­tle bit of it.  And how I do it, is fan­ning the flames of desire by par­tak­ing in things inspires me.

It takes a lit­tle explor­ing to know what truly inspires you…but it is a fun adven­ture. And then all it takes is the com­mit­ment to keep play­ing.  Yep, play.  Play with your muses. Play with art, con­ver­sa­tion, movies, books, quotes, blogs, people…whatever it is that will serve as your inspiration.

The energy will return.  You’ll look down and know that the next step was never laid out before you…it was cre­ated when you put your foot down.  And now you are inspired to do so!