How would you increase the power of your imagination? If you had to do it in order to save your own life, what methods/steps would you take to enter into such a challenge? It's a serious question, but don't let that stop you if you just want a hit-and-run shot at humor. I won't mind.

I feel like there is a parasite eating me and it's starting to implode me into something small. That's the best way I can describe it. There was a time when I was certain I could conjure without end, but now I often feel overwhelmed, like I have too many goals and no time left. My ideas, both musical and otherwise, have become utterly shallow to me.

In short, my mojo is jacked up.

My Mojo rocks!

Acid works the best but it's kind of extreme and can be dangerous...mushrooms are a bit safer, but the spirit world can be dark and foreboding. These days I mostly just stick with the weed.

Perhaps you're pushing yourself too hard.
YMMV, but I tend to be rather spontaneous about artistic endevours, and there's nothing that stifles my creativity more than trying to conjure it up in the first place.

i've been studying fantasy rpg's (and not the computer kind). it's forcing me to put a story with the art

loads of free rpg stuff here
http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/welcome

i've been listening to mostly instrumental retro lounge from http://somafm.com/ and surfing retro sites for design inspiration and memory jogging

here's a great link site
http://www.bitlounge.net/retrolounge/advertising.htm
although i can't get it to work in ff and have to fire up ie

i've also been designing papercraft. i spend free time at work designing and sketching paper toys and paper mechanisms

If my mojo was low, I'd get more sleep (preferably in the morning, but that'll never happen). I find I go into autopilot when I start to get sleep starved.

spend a few hours , at home , with an insurance salesman ...
i assure you that your mind will wander to uncharted territory ...

tip o' the hat , to woody ...

1. let go of your goals. life does not work by your plans. That of course is not to say you can make things happen as well, but it more than always never will work out exactly as you wish.

2. lay down, relax, focus on your breathing and heartbeat, open your mind and let the visions flow - almost like dreaming.

3. find other creatives, mingle

4. don't live by a routine

5. know that everything in nature is imperfect, and if you want to create something perfect, that is unnatural. more than likely the parasite is your inner critic. Say "f**k off, I'm going to do this".

6. If you find all of your ideas are shallow, simply create music/art/whatever about what you are going through. It bleeds the poison out AND you create something. Two birds.

RonC

yea, i've been concentrating on my dreams. i've also been taking advantage of the period between laying down and falling asleep. i get vivid imagery.

i haven't been forcing myself to create. i've been alowing myself to create. i go where ever i take me and try not to be judgmental

4 months ago, i came out of a period in which i stopped "thinking" because i was tired of thinking. i don't know if i was copping out or if i needed it

i know you won't take the drug advice. i'm just saying for others who might be swayed, drugs are a big lie. take it from an ex druggie

finding routine, stamped out paths in my life and getting rid of it. My mind runs on a monorail when it does get no fresh impulses from the outside world. Even the small things like picking a different way to work each day helps a bit. Avoiding work helps even more.

Sounds like you're riding the downwards spiral though.
For me goals and art don't mix. Working towards goals puts me into pressure and jails my mind. Don't let time's running out ideas drive you. Relax and remember time's not running at equal speed for every person on this planet. Time is runnning faster for people living in metropolises. The more those people have to hurry the faster their clock is running the fewer time they have and the more they have to hurry.
Soon (from earth's perspective) you'll be wormfood anyways, so what.

ironically, that's a big motivating force for me. death is coming. create a bunch o stuff and enjoy my accomplishments which i'll have no memory of nor anything else when brain ceases to function

anyway, lookin at yer sig pic and other artworks, shane, i see you know about rpg's and at least acidic visions

And even worse.. everyone else who could enjoy the works will soon be dead too.. whole mankind will be wiped out in a blink of a cosmic eye..
A glance into the night's sky reminds me evereytime how infinately small and unimportant I am, how incredible small my and my species' moment of time is... a suavely soothing realisation

either plenty of sleep for sane creativity or lack of sleep for pure insanity. I find that they can be equally productive but I am usually much more able to realize my creativity when I have slept.

drugs can help but that is a short term approach and ends up self defeating. Personally a change of perspective always makes me more creative. Go out, live life, see the world. when you get back home things just kinda flow out...

yes, the trick is to, upon the moment of your death, realize your insignificance and thus die with acceptance. not like it'll matter either way

death hurts the living. i guess feeling insignificant could be a coping method, but it seems it would make a person vulnerable
Last edited by androidlove on Wed Feb 06, 2008 9:28 pm; edited 1 time in total

i don't like to go to sleep, but i don't like to wake up

sleep deprivation will even take you on a vision quest