So here’s the question:
“I used to paint and enjoyed how time passed unnoticed while I was daubing away. But for some reason I stopped, and now it’s been years and I simply don’t know how to start again—or if I even want to paint at all. I do want to make messes of some sort, though!”
I feel it’s necessary to start with a little celebration.
I’m objectively a terrible dancer—no shade to self intended, it’s just the truth. I have a window of about ten seconds where I use up all my moves and then end up involved in some complicated swaying. But right now, I’m dedicating that full ten seconds just to you.
Because I think it’s important to remember there are two types of problems.
Problems that are, in fact, problems.
And the other sort, which are what we might call Very Good Problems To Have.
And this problem—the one that asks how we might use our creative energy again, even when we’re not sure how or in what form—is A Most Excellent, Very Good Problem To Have.
So let’s start there. With the enthusiastic embrace of this excellent problem. It allows us to proceed with a different sort of lightness.
Now, we can become creative sleuths.
The Problem of Inaction
We can probably agree that the solution to wondering where to start is just to start anywhere. You just have to begin.
That looks very good on paper and makes perfect sense when written down but for some strange and mysterious reason, it’s not that easy in Real Life.
One of the key parts of The Problem is this:
We think that if we just think about it long enough, eventually we’ll arrive at The Best Place To Start. That we can think our way to the Best Beginning.
This isn’t entirely our fault. We live in a world that loves to analyse and to question, and we’ve become skilled in overthinking and underdoing as a result.
But the key really is to do something—anything—to begin. That something may not be what you end up doing regularly or devoting yourself to, but it’s a Necessary Something to get to the thing that is.
Your brain is dedicated to all things practical. It only knows the next step it wants to take when it can observe something real—something it can see, smell, taste, or touch.
Then it’s able to assess and decide where to go next: whether to continue, to tweak, or to abandon.
The key is not to stay in your head too long. Sooner rather than later, you need to commit to making something—anything—real. It’s the only way to find out what happens next.
Once you’ve realised that “do anything” is the first step to starting again, we can move to the next one.
You have to let yourself have the experience of starting again
It might sound ridiculous, but it’s true. You haven’t done this for a while, given yourself time for your creativity. To be creative is to step into the unknown.
Take your whole self with you. Let yourself be in this place, the place of a person figuring it out and starting again.
Don’t be surprised by what comes up when you meet yourself there: that it feels strange or clunky, that you’re not sure what you’re doing, that you feel frustrated.
Of course you do—you haven’t been here for a while. Don’t let those feelings convince you you’re doing something wrong.
Here’s another thing that’s helpful to know:
Writing, drawing, painting (literally anything) is a movement pattern (at least from the perspective of your nervous system and brain), just like riding a bike, surfing, or running.
If you haven’t done those things for a while, you don’t expect to be a pro straight away. You might laugh at your lack of coordination, but you also understand the only way to get better is to keep going. That it just might take some time.
Creating of any sort is the same, we just come at it with a much more rigid perspective. We somehow think about it differently. But essentially, it’s identical. You have to grease those neural pathways, drop yourself into your creative brain (even if it takes a while to find it).
You have to give yourself enough grace to have the experience of starting again.
Where to start?
With whatever piques your curiosity.
If you look at something and think, I’d love to be able to do that, or that looks fun, start there.
You don’t have to be brilliant (a friend said this to me recently and I found it incredibly liberating).
Follow Your Curiosity Into Action
I’ve become a little bit obsessed with following my natural curiosities into action as and when the impulse arises (or as close to), instead of deferring it to some point in the future.
We’re trained from a young age to follow schedules that tell us when to eat, move, and rest. Over time, we become schedule-led instead of body-led, and then we wonder why we feel disconnected from our instincts in other areas of life.
The same pattern shows up in our creative lives. We think it would be better to wait until we have a big chunk of time, the perfect setup, or a fully formed plan—hello, control patterns and perfectionist tendencies—but what if we stopped waiting for the conditions to be ideal?
If you feel that spark of curiosity or movement inside you, act in service of the impulse, even in the smallest way. Don’t wait for the future to make it easier. It rarely does.
And if you can’t act in that moment, at least notice it. Then, as soon as you can, make a movement in that direction.
Hang Out With People Who Do The Thing You Want To Do
There are two things we’re missing, as human people in this world:
First, communities of makers who normalise that making art is a necessary and important thing to do.
And second, places that help us take action—that help us translate longing or ideas into actually sitting down and doing the thing.
I have a creative membership called Creating Wild that focuses on exactly this, so I can speak from experience: it is transformative.
I’m not saying join my thing (although you’re absolutely welcome to). What I am saying is: find your people. Hunt them down with creative ferocity, in whatever way is available to you. You’ll be thankful when you do.
If I could pull you aside now and offer some parting words, they would be these:
That inkling you have—that thought about painting again, or creating again—it means something. It counts for something.
Let yourself follow it, and trust that you already have enough within you to figure it out as you go.
So start where you are. With the tools you have, the time you have, and the curiosity that have realised never left you. That’s all you need to begin again.
Happy creating!
xx Jane