3 Ideas for Staying Inspired this Winter

It's almost the end of daylight-savings time! During the colder, shorter days of the winter months, you will be tempted to curl up on the couch after work and watch TV. But, as a designer, it's important to keep your creative juices flowing with inspiring activities; otherwise your designs will become as stale as those after-work reruns. Here are three good options for activities that will help defeat the winter blues and keep you inspired:  

1. Sign up for yoga or mediation Yoga and mediation are two ways for creative people to achieve better focus and consciousness in their personal lives and in their work. Yoga harmonizes the mind and the body. Aside from its numerous physical health benefits, Yoga gives people a feeling of energized well-being, or openness and alertness, which can have a wonderful influence on a designers' work. Meditation is another practice that can help you to achieve a sense of focus, and filter out the great ideas from the general stream of consciousness racing through your mind. There's a wonderful book by the filmmaker David Lynch, called "Catching the Big Fish: Meditation, Consciousness, and Creativity," in which Lynch shares anecdotes about how his transcendental meditation practice a has influenced his art. It's definitely worth checking out.   2. Enroll in improv If you feel like you are in a rut, coming up with the same design solutions over and over, maybe an improvisation class can help. In a beginner's improv class, there will probably be lots of other nervous novices just like you. You will play games that hinge on quick thinking and response to what another participant has said. The exercises tend to improve people's confidence, ability to take risks, critical thinking and creativity. All of these skills can be applied back into the design business, with how you interact with clients and how open you are to experimenting with new concepts and ideas in your work.   3. Take a drawing or photography class Taking a drawing class is a good way to sharpen your skills as a graphic designer. The drawing will strengthen your ability to get an idea or concept down on paper. If you've never had any formal drawing training, this can be a big help for sketching ideas and thumbnails for design clients. If there is a class available on rendering physical objects, it might be worth a try, too. Photography is another great way to keep your mind, and your eye, sharp. Photography class will have you sizing up objects or scenes in the real world, in terms of photo-composition. You can also play with light, color and photo editing tools, and all of these skills can transfer back into the design business.