The Creative's Digital Detox: Finding Inspiration Offline in a Connected World
We’ve spent some time talking about staying authentic and creative in this new world that is filled with technology and AI. We live in a fast paced society where you can quickly fall behind and become irrelevant. We want to be in a position where people will consume our art but at the same time we cannot lose touch ourselves or our creativity. What are some ways we can disconnect from the digital age and rediscover ways to authentically inspire yourself and build your creative brand?
As helpful and interesting as AI can be in our lives let's take some time to step back and disconnect. It’s okay to unplug and feel the cool breeze from the trees flow around your body and soul. Let’s take some time to talk about how we can intentionally disconnect this week. And hopefully when we come back to reality, we can continue to have appreciation for the things that make us human.
Balanced Life
We need to find balance in our lives. There is a fine line between the helpfulness of technology and becoming overly dependent on it. In this day in age, it’s often hard not to solely depend on technology to help inspire us for our art work or for it to create our artwork entirely. That is why we must find a healthy balance on our use of technology when it comes to our creative pieces. A few of the ways that I believe can help create a balance is by scheduling time away from technology, taking time to enjoy nature walks, and being more hands on with creation and discovering what helps inspire your creativity. Here are some of these ways talked about more in depth that we can be intentional about doing when trying to find a balance.
Schedule Time
This is a tricky balance to find time to be offline but not lose your connection to the entire world. We have grown up in a world where all we know is being connected to the internet. We are always just a few clicks away from anything we want. This has us more connected to the world than ever before and yet somehow we still struggle to find connections.
We need to be more intentional about how we spend our lives. Unplugging allows us to not be distracted by all the noise the technology carries with it. We often feel a pressure when on the internet because everyone expects us to be a certain way or to create a certain thing. We have unrealistic expectations to live up to. But taking the time away will allow our brains to refresh and a have a clean slate from all the noise. Even with all these benefits from unplugging for a little bit it still doesn’t come naturally to us. Now don’t let that stop you, schedule time to intentionally put away your electronics and just experience life. Now that you have some time scheduled you need to figure out what you are going to do with it.
Take a Nature Walk
You can get outside and explore nature. Go for a walk on a local path or park. Find somewhere new you’ve never been before and just take time to take everything in. Bring a notebook and pen with you so you can describe what you see or jot down any ideas that come to you while you are off of your phone and computer. Be sure to leave your phone in the car or at home. You need to rid yourself of the temptation to look at it as you are spending time disconnected. If it’s a reach away trust me you will grab for it at some point; that’s just our nature in this world we live in. This will be challenging but will be rewarding in the end. There is a beauty to connecting with the physical world and getting outside. It can give us life. It helps relieve depression and anxiety. It can help spark new ideas in our minds.
Getting out into the world can spark fresh ideas. Learn how to describe new things you come across. You could practice your writing by jotting down all the words that come to mind when you look at it. Being outside and taking in all that nature has to offer can allow your brain to be challenged and let the creativiity juices to work. This will allow you to come up with new things that you may have never thought about before.
Hands on creation
Being out in nature is great for creativity, but when you return to the digital world, you need a way to translate your new inspirations. In this section, let's explore how to effectively capture and integrate your ideas back into the digital space. When you're out creating, pen and paper are going to be your best friends. Your thoughts may be scattered throughout the pages of your journal or notepad, so when you get back, you'll want to organize everything.
No matter what app you use to organize your content—whether that's Notion, Apple Notes/Pages, Google Docs, or something else—take time to transfer what you've captured in your notebooks to your digital notes. This transfer process helps you better remember what you created. It allows your mind to retain new ideas and expand upon them later.
If you find yourself struggling to find inspiration, maybe it's time to take a digital detox. Take some time away from the digital space and get your thoughts onto a piece of paper. This may come naturally to some people but may feel unnatural to others. In the end it will be worth it to get free from the digital space and learn to create on your own just using your mind.
