Create: Day 22
March 22, 2011 
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Day 22
Be blue and daydream, too.
Jonah Lehrer has great posts in his blog The Frontal Cortex. Here’s something that resonated with me.
We all know environment can dramatically affect creativity. For instance, I’ve noticed I have a hard time easing into writing when my house is messy.
The color blue.
An interesting study in the esteemed magazine Science showed the effect of colors on the way the mind works. Red is best for, according to a New York Times article about the study, “tests of recall and attention to detail, like remembering words or checking spelling and punctuation”, while blue works for “imagination, like inventing creative uses for a brick or creating toys from shapes.”
Lehrer, author of Proust was a Neuroscientist, says:
“My hunch is that blue is like a warm shower – because we’re more relaxed, we’re better able to eavesdrop on those remote associations that are most likely to generate the creative epiphany…Of course, sometimes you don’t want to be creative – you want to be accurate. This is why it’s a good idea to have red and blue rooms in your home, a color for every mode of thought.”
For Geekists who want to know more about why this might be so… from an article Lehrer wrote for The New Yorker:
“The insight process as sketched by Jung-Beeman and Kounios is a delicate mental balancing act. At first, the brain needs to control itself… But then, once the brain is sufficiently focused, the cortex needs to relax… “The relaxation phase is crucial,” Jung-Beeman says. “That’s why so many insights happen during warm showers.” (In other words, it’s not an accident that Archimedes shouted “Eureka!” in the bath.) Another ideal moment for insights, according to the scientists, is the early morning, right after we wake up. The drowsy brain is unwound and disorganized, open to all sorts of unconventional ideas.”
Read entire New Yorker article here.
Create Month 1
What to do so far:
In case you missed a day, the reminders below are clickable.
Have fun.
Be violent and original in your creative life.
Make collages (dream boards, vision boards).
Leave perfectionism behind.
Take risks by throwing out tons of ideas.
Set aside time every Sunday to work on art.
Moodle (going on an “artist date”) once a month on Saturdays (to start).
Make more time for creativity by ditching something else.
Schedule moodling (artist date) for next month.
Try setting a timer for 11 minutes for a fast, creative break.
Decide what you’d need in order to finish one of your shelved projects.
Join with other artists.
Practice for expertise, play for yourself.
On the Ides, I’d rather be ______.
Be green and glean.
Live your passions in your work.
Protect your artist space.
Customize creative habithacking.
Good enough is plenty good.
Abandon your projects or commit to them.
Use your environment to best advantage (i.e. red for proofreading; blue for first drafts)
There is so much pressure to be perfect these days, that is very refreshing.
Jennifer
But Ms. Jennifer, you ARE perfect. Dang. All the rest of us are trying to keep up.