Most creative people are working in really high-pace environments that are not playgrounds for our best ideas. We have a creative capacity far beyond what we engage in every day – our potential. The irony is, our best and most inventive opportunities exist beyond what we are used to…beyond what we know…far beyond our status quo.
Often times, we find ourselves in a “Liminal Space.” Psychologists call the Liminal Space: “a place where we stand on the threshold getting ourselves ready to move across the limits of what we were, into what we are to be.”
Liminal Space is great, for a season, but as creative professionals, we must constantly be moving forward, rather than on the edge of where we’ve been and where we’re headed. In order to engage such a space, we have to do a few things:
1. Break our routine. Not just break it…destroy it. Get in a place where we are forced to see, think, smell, and experience different things.
2. Be quiet. Shut down sound, distraction, and anything that grabs our attention. In order to go where we need to go, we have to clear the fog around us so we can see the proper route.
3. Fight status quo. Easy to do in groups…hard to do in self. We have to abandon our comforts and the things we have come to count on if we want to get out of our Liminal Space.
4. Be willing to chase your personal next. What is next for you and your art? We fall in love with the things we create that we know are successful, but reaching our potential means being willing to dig deep and find our NEXT art. It’s the sign of great artists.
I would say go out on a limb, risk failure and looking like a fool (seriously).
Great post Stephen!