Flashback Friday is all about remembering who you are as a creative person.

I have learnt the hard way that creative mistakes, creative heartbreaks and disappointments can have a stifling effect on your creative confidence. I have learnt to recognise the noose of creative block tightening around my neck. So I have developed a few techniques that help to bring creative confidence back into my realm.

One of the most powerful techniques I have discovered is what I call ‘Creative Flashbacks’.

Creative flashbacks are hidden treasures deep in the archives of your life, like the times in your life when you may have experienced the most creativity and passion. It’s about reconnecting and rediscovering those creative times. Flashbacks give you clues how to find your creative gold.

A creative flashback is an opportunity to acknowledge your creative success and learn from the failures. A flashback is not about trying to re-enact an experience, it’s about the acknowledgment. Acknowledgement helps to stack the odds in your favour against creative block and uncover your creative spirit.

A flashback could be a school, work or community project in which you were involved. Travel, renovating, a DIY project, a class you took, a career move. Dig deep and find one or two things that you are really proud of and acknowledge yourself for the creative thinking and activity. It’s real shift in paradigm.

A good way to start is to remember a flashback, and then ask yourself the what, how and why.

• What was I doing, what was the creative?
• What were the connections that led me to that place in my life?
• What did I have to do?
• How did I make that happen?
• How was I being?
• How was I thinking?
• How was I feeling?
• Why did I do it that way?
• Why did I make that creative decision?

For example, a creative Flashback for me is when I was studying design at University, (I can remember back that far). Studying design seems pretty obvious I know, but it was not the learning, or the hands on creative work that stands out for me during those 4 years.

What stands out most are the relationships and the life long creative friendships I formed that provided me with insights into the creative person I am. The experience of being with friends as ‘creative playmates’, people on the same wavelength, people I admired, people who understood what I was there to achieve, people who understood ideas. I valued those friendships; they showed me different ways of looking at things and my worldview changed because of it. It helped me form the view that I am a creative person.

These friends taught me how to push through the hard stuff, taught me how to ease into my creativity, to accept and acknowledge the creative person I am. That has stayed with me forever and this is what I tap into when my creative confidence is lacking. I am also lucky enough to have the privilege of still having these people in my life over 20 years later.

The second part of this tip is to have a visual reminder of the Flashback. Most obviously it would be a photo, but it could also be a song that represents the soundtrack to your life at that time. It might be a book, a memento, anything that makes the experience real and taps you into the experience in a tangible way.

Take that Flashback and pin it up where you can see it as a daily reminder of who you are as a creative person, I guarantee you, it will have an impact.

And PS. Share your flashbacks and pass on your creative insights ♥ Amanda