How to survive a Creative Rut, by Nadia Meli

Photo by nadiameli.com

Nadia Meli is an amazing portrait photographer based in the UK and a beloved member of Squaremuse’s Marketing and Communications team. As someone who’s been a creative for her whole life, Nadia is no stranger to creative ruts and the negative effects they can have on one’s confidence and mental state.

In this article, she’s sharing her favorite and most effective tips on how to navigate and survive creative slumps. Enjoy!

1. Do it anyway. Create even if you don’t feel like it. Create for the sake of it.

• Create something that you’ve never tried before. If you are a photographer, try painting for an afternoon. Drawing. Make music. Try filming a short video. Write a poem, or simply journal. Writing down your thoughts can help.

• Shoot through the pain. Even though you are not inspired, shoot anyway. Sometimes the joy and inspiration come back while you’re out there working anyway.

• And remember: just because you don’t love it, doesn’t mean it’s actually bad! You’re just too closed and wrapped up in it to see the beauty that other people may see in it.

2. Do nothing. Step away from your craft and take time off.

• Do things that don’t relate to your craft, your job. Just live life. As creatives we need to experience things in order to create - so go and experience life. Love your people. Laugh. Cook. Read. Have conversations. Be curious. Just do life and feed your spirit. Inspiration more often than not comes when you don’t think about it - it does not come when you force it.

• Go on a holiday, a short trip away, even just a day trip to a new place - with or without your camera. Fresh places, fresh eyes. Fresh inspiration.

• Move! That’s a wonderful short term solution if you are in need of a quick refresh while you’re working. Put on some music and dance. Go for a walk or a run. Get some fresh air. Incorporate regular breaks.

• Unfollow or mute the peers that do what you do - for example if you are a wedding photographer, unfollow other wedding photographers. It’s absolutely not personal - it’s a great tool to protect your creativity and gain some perspective. You can unmute and follow back once you feel like you are in a better place. It works wonders.

• Consume content from different creatives and artists - look beyond what your industry is doing. Seeing the same thing over and over again won’t inspire a new idea and most likely won’t get your creative juices flowing. Look at creations, art and industries that are completely different from your own.

Photo by nadiameli.com

3. Ask yourself if it’s time for a change

Sometimes, when you feel your inspiration has run dry, it’s because an actual change needs to happen. Sometimes there are other things going on in your life that need to be addressed that block your creative juices from flowing.

Those can be business changes or deeply personal ones. If you feel consistently stuck and are unable to work for a long period of time then it’s worth sitting down and be honest with yourself? Is there anything you are avoiding to do that is keeping you stuck? Do you need to change your business, but you’re scared? Do you need to change location? Do you need to make an important decision that you’re procrastinating? Check in with yourself to see if there is something blocking your creative energy.

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If you’re in that space now, just know that it’s completely natural and that it will pass.

Your creativity will come back, you will feel inspired again. It might just take some time, but it never leaves you. It’s part of your makeup and your essence. You are a creator and your core will always feel the need to create. The fact that you feel stuck creatively shows that something in you really wants to, but can’t. So ride it out, just like a wave, it’s coming back to you.