Re-engage and Observe

Welcome back to a new semester. Just four months stand between us and summer, and hopefully that time will be full of learning, creativity, and growth for all of us. To help jump-start the creative part, I would like to propose a small project to anyone interested.

When I walk around campus, it seems like most of the people I pass have put up barriers against the outside world – walking around with headphones constantly in or a phone glued to their ear. I am frequently guilty of these same practices myself, and the result is that I pay much less attention to my surroundings. Everyday sights blur into a single image that never seems to change, even though it must be different in some way every day. Therefore, the project I am suggesting is an observation log. Force yourself to actively search and engage your environment to find those small and strange details that can provide inspiration in your life and which remain completely hidden to a passive observer. Maybe you’ll hear a snippet of conversation you find interesting, recognize a pattern you never realized existed before, read a strange fact, or something else you consider worth remembering.

I found my old Observation Log today and some of my favorite entries include:

1)  “I don’t need boyfriends or girlfriends; I’ve got squirrelfriends!”

2)  Every human spent about 30 minutes as a single cell.

3)  “I don’t want to be buried in a cactus!”

“I think you mean casket.”

4)  According to some sources, the paper sticking out of the top of a Hershey’s Kiss is called a niggly-wiggly.

5)  I saw a girl step on worm.  She then did a little hop, looked down, and apologized to it.

A couple of my observations have stuck around in my memory, but I had completely forgotten several of them, and it was fun to reread them. I ended up using some of my entries for creative writing projects last year, while others remain simply as oddities I’ve collected and are still waiting to be used. When I did this project before, the goal was to write down at least three things a day. The great thing about having an observation log is the next time you’re stuck in an uninspired state, you’ll have a file of interesting notes, thoughts, and extemporanea to feed your mind and promote your creativity.

Good luck this semester!