by Jamie Chavez | Apr 11, 2016 | Creativity
When I was in my early thirties, I had a love affair with Mozart. (It continues to this day, actually. How could it not?) I was the daughter of a classically trained pianist, had taken twelve years of classical piano lessons myself, and already had a very serious...
by Jamie Chavez | Feb 11, 2016 | Creativity
Reflect for a moment on the quality of mind that is least creative—when the mind buzzes like the white noise on a TV screen. This is “monkey mind,” a cacophony of voices and sensations. Everything seems possible and nothing gets done. Contrast that to the clarity of a...
by Jamie Chavez | Feb 4, 2016 | Creativity
The ability to listen is a skill we are honing. … Art is not about thinking something up. It is about the opposite—getting something down. The directions are important here. If we are trying to think something up, we are straining to reach for something that’s just...
by Jamie Chavez | Nov 19, 2015 | Creativity
The conversation focused on the unavoidable uncertainty, vulnerability, and discomfort of the creative process. … Absolutely no amount of experience or success gives you a free pass from the daunting level of doubt that is an unyielding part of the process. … [I call...
by Jamie Chavez | Nov 16, 2015 | Creativity
The photo you see below stopped me in my tracks when I saw it on Facebook about a year ago. It spoke to me. Some of you may know these friends of mine—twins, their mother, and their aunt—but if you don’t, and if you’re willing to let your imagination roam, you...
by Jamie Chavez | Nov 12, 2015 | Authors & Other Writers, Creativity
Every work of art is one half of a secret handshake, a challenge that seeks the password, a heliograph flashed from a tower window, an act of hopeless optimism in the service of bottomless longing. Every great record or novel or comic book convenes the first meeting...
