My friends are wonderfully creative people and they inspire me daily. But there is this nagging feeling that they can all attune themselves to this creative frequency that I cannot access myself. This is partly why I've found pursuing art properly difficult: I rarely have much to say.
That doesn't mean things don't interest or drive me. Just the moment the pen is in my hand, or my fingers are at the keyboard, I find there's no shapes or words. It even affected my dissertation quite heavily at the beginning, where I knew the topic of what I wanted to cover but finally expressing it using my own words felt impossible. But I persevered (I haven't written as much as I would like for it yet, but the largest hurdles have been overcome).
It was this small victory that pushed me to now, wanting to once again try and build on the skill that is creativity. Though, a muscle may be a more fitting term, as I have the skills needed for creativity, I just lack strength in the muscle that uses these skills.
The key is small and often.
It sounds obvious, but you would be suprised how often I ignore this one rule. My usual approach to things creative tends to be throwing myself in the deep end, either I will learn to swim or be forced to drown. This meant, whilst I rushed to make the things I wanted to make, I missed the fundamentals of the discipline, something I'm having to put a lot of time in to fix. Now, I'm having to actually learn anatomy and perspective in drawing, basic seams in sewing, and the rules of writing.
So what has this to do with a story?
I wouldn't say I'm aiming towards a novel: that would be absurd. All I wanted was to have characters in a world of my own, so when I am learning these artistic fundamentals I can apply them to something that isn't fanart. That way, if people do follow my socials, then they follow it for me instead of my interests. It's quite selfish, I realise.
Luckily there's been this one idea brewing for quite a while. But I cannot just build it all at once, I need to stretch this muscle out, learn how to do things the proper way! So, I've been reintroduced to the beauty that is a drabble. A story written in exactly 100 words. It feels similar to limiting yourself to only 10 or 20 strokes in a painting. Because of the limited size, you have to learn how to be purposeful and exact with your words. You cannot physcially babble on about something unless you want the drabble to be about that one specific thing.
What would be fun, when I am not drowning in essay writing, would be to do a month challenge. Something like inktober, where each day you have a prompt, and just write a drabble using that prompt. Using this, I could see if I could flesh out this idea I have running around my brain and make something of it. The random words would mean I would have to question things I wouldn't think to tackle. And, not to speak too soon, but 100 words seems much easier than an entire drawing.
(PS. I have not forgotten my Sherlock project, I just cannot engage with the victorian period when I have to be focusing on the 1300-1400s. My brain works only with one time period at a time)