Feels Like Summer

It’s interesting how a few blog posts and a change in the weather can spark a thought and approach to something. I’m specifically talking about work here, and focusing further, inspiration.

Everything started on Saturday evening when I came across a post on Hivelogic entitled “Offices and The Creativity Zone”. As I read the post I identified with many of the points about finding the “Zone” and it got me reflecting on the last few weeks of design work I’ve done. Now that I feel settled into my first job a little more, I’ve had this slight feeling that I’ve lost that “Zone” in recent weeks. That relaxed feeling I somehow managed to keep with me from Uni as I started my working life seemed to have ebbed away a little.

Me being me, that realisation started to make me think. I obviously wanted that creativity, that spark to come back. I enjoy designing and without that ability to focus and find the “Zone” I’d find it hard to enjoy.

Fortunately waking up on Sunday morning to a bright and sunny day coupled with the longer days sparked the beginning of something. It felt nice and fresh and like the first day of summer. More importantly I felt a little bit of a spark returning. I wanted to begin with something here on Electric Weekend. I wanted to blog, but after starting a few posts recently and not getting any kind of flow in my writing I was unable to create something I liked to read, let alone what anyone else would like to read.

But that wasn’t the end of it. Monday morning arrived and with it a new week at work. Hoping to help my little feeling of creativity grow I began work. A small and quick project seemed to provide that extra bit of spark I was looking for, but it still didn’t feel quite right. In my quest to find a little more creativity I went on a search of the internets. I’m not sure how, but I came across Elliot Jay Stocks’ blog. Straight away I was intrigued. I liked the look of the blog and some of the posts were attracting my attention, more specifically for my particular hour of need a set of posts focused Elliot’s design inspiration. I began to read through the post and looked at the images he had taken, and gradually my mind started to turn. Ideas began to grow and I was off. My creative juices were flowing, and for a good hour and a half I immersed myself in creating something a little more interesting than the things I had been generating.

I guess what I really wanted to remind myself of with this post, is that it doesn’t always have to be design or art that is the cause of inspiration. It can literally be anything. I don’t need to just focus on one area to find inspiration, it’s everywhere in God’s world . From His creation itself to the writings of a guy on his blog, inspiration is everywhere we just need to open our eyes to see it.