Where do you find your inspiration?? 20 possibilities

Our chief want is someone who will inspire us to be what we know we could be. 

Ralph Waldo Emerson 

Our chief want is someone who will inspire us to be what we know we could be.
Read more at http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/quotes/r/ralphwaldo130588.html#3aXWtx5Q88lrMHjF.99

Sugar Palace

http://fineartamerica.com/featured/the-sugar-palace--river-road-blues-lianne-schneider.html

We've all run into it at once time or another - artists' block, writers' block - just plain creatively blocked. It's frustrating, even a bit scary. I once went six months unable to write a single poem and I was absolutely certain that I'd never write again. I joked about how my muse had gone on vacation and just decided not to return. But I was extremely distressed. I turned to art then tentatively at first, and was inspired by history, the blues, and certainly other artists. But the writer's block persisted and the creative block returned even about the art work. 

Maybe that happens because we just have too much on our plates at any given time and we need to withdraw from creative activities. That's what I tried to tell myself, at least.  But the truth is if we need to withdraw from creating...then it's not an essential part of who we are. Our art, our writing should be many things to us - therapeutic, cathartic, joyful, fulfilling - but it shouldn't be something we can just walk away from for months at a time without concern. Regardless of what our responsibilities are, if it's fundamental to our identities, then we have to MAKE time for it, no matter what. If that means getting out of bed an hour early or going to bed an hour later, so be it.

So what on earth do you do when absolutely nothing seems to inspire you, when you look at that blank sheet of paper or that empty canvas and don't have a single creative thought? Great artists and great writers have offered all kinds of advice - I remember reading something in poet May Sarton's journal where she said that no matter what she felt or didn't feel, she MADE herself sit down and write for at least one hour every single morning. It didn't matter if all she wrote were remembered lines of an old poem or someone's speech - she wrote whatever popped into her head for at least an hour. Sometimes, though, even such a disciplined approach won't work. 

Here's a great list of ideas for inspiration from the folks at ArtProMotivate:
"Feeling inspired can be tough at times, especially for artists who have a 9-5 job outside of art. We may be too tired to think straight, or distracted by our daily routine. In such situations, we have to search for sources of inspiration and creativity." Read the rest at: 
20 Art Inspiration Ideas for Creativity - Artpromotivate

Remember too that one of the most creatively inspiring things we can do is teach or inspire someone else. There's an old adage that says whatever it is you wish to learn, teach. Lead by example. In teaching others to plumb their own creative depths and find their own unique expression, we discover over and over again that the well of our creativity is bottomless.