How Travel Enhances My Creativity
The times that I get away from home are the times where I am often at my most productive in writing.
Traveling to Wild Places “Off-Grid”
I usually go to “wild places” with little human habitation.
I go to explore, and feel inspired by nature, as I find natural places “feed my soul” in a way no other thing or place can.
Posts that I have written after I have been away at these places are pieces I have written “in the flow” with the words and feelings bursting to get out of me.
In 2018, I went off-grid twice and on these two occasions:
- wrote a poem about a sun shower I listened to as it pelted down for less than a minute; as well as two pieces about
- how resting in wild places makes me feel, and
- how the river I swam in affected me.
Away from my usual routines and way of life, I am free to:
- contemplate
- rest
- rejuvenate and
- focus on the natural world around me.
I also spend more time traveling internally via:
- meditating
- being quiet
- and being still.
Experiencing Difference
When I am away from my normal life, I am having new experiences, seeing new people and places, and absorbing ‘differences.’
With the difference, I compare, contrast and make judgments, and this sparks my urge to write, to sort out my feelings and in the joy of writing to unhash and untangle and make sense of these new experiences and places.
Having a Break From My Creative Pursuits
Sometimes, when I travel and I do not have access to my paints, or my computer; I find it helps me return longing to get back into the creative loves of my life.
Having the breakaway fires up my passion, and renews my desire to engage again creatively.
This is especially so when I have had prolonged time away from being able to satisfy myself with the daily creative routines I am used to participating in at home.
Writing by Hand Not on Computer
I always take a pen and paper if I do not have a computer with me, or am off the grid as I cannot log onto the internet.
At these off-grid times, I write stories and thoughts and hash over feelings so that when I go home, I can type my words and form a more coherent story.
Often writing by hand means, I capture my emotions in a flowing and more raw sense than when I type on the computer.
The act of using my fingers with a pen, somehow activates my brain differently?
I find that the way I express myself is more vulnerable and authentic.
Longhand versus Typing?
Other writers have expressed how writing in longhand is a different (and a better) experience for them than when they type.
Dr. Virginia Berniger wrote why she thought this might be:
“The difference…may lie in the fact that with writing, you use your hand to form the letters (and connect them), thereby more actively engaging the brain in the process. Typing, on the other hand, involves just selecting letters by pressing identical-looking keys.”
In Summary
So, to summarize, the experience of travel has always been productive in relation to my creativity.
- I have new experiences and so am full of new inspiration.
- I am rejuvenating myself in nature and thereby the inspiration and experience of nature alongside spending more extended periods in meditation stimulates reflection and thereby positively impacts on my creativity.
- I usually write in longhand when I am off-grid, and this accesses different parts of my brain when I write, so I often feel I write “inflow” and with a “writer’s high” more frequently.
There are so many different places that I wish to travel to within Australia and also internationally in the coming years (my twilight years) and especially when I retire.
I so look forward to the new experiences and the enrichment this will bring.
This piece is in response to the January prompt “Travel and Creativity” by Lindsay Linegar from Creative Humans.
