Unleash your imagination on May 30th for National Creativity Day!
Whether you are an artist, writer, musician, filmmaker, blogger, photographer, graphic artist, or any of 100 other creative personalities, the world is going to celebrate you and your creative pursuit. And you absolutely deserve it! Other than nature, everything within sight originated with a creative thought from someone like you!
Hal Croasmun and ScreenwritingU founded National Creativity Day in 2018 to celebrate the imaginative spirits everywhere and to encourage them to keep creating.
National Creativity Day was founded by Hal Croasmun and ScreenwritingU “to celebrate the imaginative spirits everywhere and to encourage them to keep creating.” It is a day to nurture your creativity, to be imaginative, and to support the creativity of others. There are all types of creative people, such as artists, writers, photographers, musicians, and filmmakers. But one doesn’t need to be an expert in a field in order to be creative—those who just dabble in creative pursuits can benefit from doing so. Kurt Vonnegut once wrote:
“The arts are not a way to make a living. They are a very human way of making life more bearable. Practicing an art, no matter how well or badly, is a way to make your soul grow, for heaven’s sake. Sing in the shower. Dance to the radio. Tell stories. Write a poem to a friend, even a lousy poem. Do it as well as you possibly can. You will get an enormous reward. You will have created something.”
On National Creativity Day, this sentiment is embraced, and we set out to harness our creative energies and create!
Spend the day supporting the creativity of others and encouraging others to continue being creative. Nurture your own creativity and learn strategies to enhance it. You could read an article such as 25 Ways to Be More Creative, which goes over author and psychologist Keith Sawyer’s eight steps to be more creative, from his book Zig Zag: The Surprising Path to Greater Creativity. You could read that book or another book of his on the topic, Explaining Creativity: The Science of Human Innovation.
There are an almost limitless amount of creative things you could do or things you could do to help get you into a creative mood:
Write a priority list with your hopes and goals, or make a vision board.
- Join a book club.
- Meditate.
- Avoid technology for the day and connect and engage with the things around you. Say “hello” to people you pass on the street, and notice birds, trees, flowers, and the beauty that can be found everywhere.
- Organize. Start with something small like organizing a drawer or a closet, and then expand to a whole room.
- Call a friend.
- Write in your personal journal or diary, or start one if you don’t have one. Journaling helps you understand and reflect on your inner thoughts.
- Pick a topic and do some freewriting. Write a poem or a short story. Begin writing a novel or screenplay. Write a letter to a friend. Write a letter to your past self, or write a letter to your future self and put it in a time capsule.
- Begin learning how to play a new instrument or play an instrument you already know.
- Start a band. Get your old band back together. Sing in the shower. Sing in the car. Sing some karaoke.
- Take a walk and get into nature.
- Read poetry in public.
- Join a theater group.
- Take dance lessons or go dancing.
- Host a comedy show.
- Do some visual art such as drawing, painting, sculpting, collaging, photography, or videography. Draw in a sketchbook or use an adult coloring book.
- Visit a museum or art gallery, or travel around a city looking at murals.
- Do some sewing, needlepoint, knitting, pottery, or candle making.
- Make some new recipes.
- Plant a garden.
- Play a board game.
