Sometimes this is how my brain feels and sometimes it feels like this. There's just a lot of things to think about
and sometimes they get in the way of doing other things,
like being creative and making art. So I decided to try something
that might help with that. This is the book The Artist's Way. And in it, Julia Cameron talks
about the daily practice of morning pages, three pages of daily
longhand, stream of consciousness written first thing upon arising. There are a lot of people who have claimed
that morning pages changed their life, so I thought I would commit to 30 days
of writing morning pages to see if they might change my life too the first week went by pretty easily. All right. Week one, check in. I'm feeling very optimistic about writing
morning pages, and I definitely see how they can be really helpful. I've always enjoyed
writing out my thoughts and it helps me sort through whatever's
been going through my mind lately and doing it in this way feels a little more productive
than writing in a typical journal. Morning pages are meant to be
a simple practice with big results. The pages are simple yet profound. We discover an inner voice that speaks
to us with greater and greater clarity. Now, while there's no wrong way to do
them, you can do whatever is best for you. There are some aspects to consider
so that you get the most out of them. As I mentioned, morning pages should be
done daily and first thing in the morning. This is because the pages are not meant to be a recounting
of what happened in the day you just had. It's not like a journal or a diary
where you document the events of each day. It's a way to clear our minds
and prepare us for the day ahead. They give us space in our brain so that we can approach the rest
of the day with more clarity. Check in number two. So I've been doing morning pages
for two weeks now and I have managed to keep up with it every day,
making sure to write at least something. It has been really helpful when there is something immediately
that I've been thinking about a lot that I need to work through
and it helps a lot to write it down. But when there's not something that's immediately on my mind,
I feel like it's a chore. But with that being said,
I still feel like it's important to do it every day as a daily habit rather than
just the days that you feel like doing it. Even when it feels like pushing
a boulder up a hill. Having the daily practice
will prepare you for being creative. This is because discipline is an often overlooked
but key aspect of living a creative life. And no matter what it is, you write. Keeping up with the daily
habit will produce benefits as well. Which brings me to my next point. What does it mean to write stream
of consciousness and why is it important? As I mentioned, this is not a journal. Think of it more like a brain dump. A way to rid yourself of those unwanted
thoughts. Living rent free in your brain. Thoughts like what
Julia Cameron calls mental static that pesky voice
that follows you around saying things like you need to sort the laundry
or don't forget to buy some pasta. These are just noise that cloud your thoughts and keep you
from focusing on your priorities. You may also find yourself using morning
pages for venting and ranting and whining. That's normal. They can be used to take those negative thoughts out of your brain
so that you left with the optimistic and hopeful thoughts
for the rest of the day. That's why morning pages are unique. They're not meant to be high art. You're not trying to write something
profound. In fact, it's best to avoid
any kind of perfectionism with these. They're meant to be messy,
so you may end up writing sentences that are only half finished
or that don't make any sense. Or you may write pointless things
like I don't know what to write. You also shouldn't
let anyone else read these, and you probably shouldn't go back
and read them yourself. You write them
and then you're done with them. The third recommendation is that you write three full pages in longhand. Now, if the idea of writing that much
seems daunting, use a smaller book. The goal is to commit
to finishing three full pages, no matter how much writing
that actually is. However, Julia Cameron does believe
that three pages of eight and a half by 11 paper is the most ideal. Also, the book itself isn't that important,
just as long as it's one dedicated to your morning pages
and nothing else. So you might be wondering
why you have to use a pen when it's the 21st century and we have computers
and even phones we could use if that's what's best for you,
write your morning pages digitally. However, you will see more results
if you write them in longhand. This is because longhand
requires us to slow down. And by slowing down, we connect
to our emotions and our intuitions. Writing things down instead of typing them
makes our words carry more importance. It's not easy to delete or backtrack
on what we are saying. It takes more time
and it doesn't allow for editing. Typing may be less time
consuming and more efficient, but efficient doesn't
include better in this case. Writing by hand allows for more reflection
and self-awareness, and you're less likely to be emotionally
detached from the practice. There are definitely
days where it feels very helpful to just get
whatever is on my mind onto the page. And then there's days
where it's like just pushing through. It's like walking through mud. It's not fun. Page two almost always feels like a chore. On page one, I can write
whatever is immediately on my mind. And then page two is like,
What do I write next? What do I write next? And then I'll usually come up
with something and fill up page three. But page two is hard. It's important to know
that you're not always going to be in the mood to do your morning pages,
so it's best to set everything up beforehand
so there's less resistance. You may find that having a specific spot
helps somewhere that's comfortable
and free from distractions. Or you may want to silence your phone,
grab a drink, or even feed the cat ahead of time. You may prefer to have some music playing
in the background, something free from lyrics
so it doesn't call your attention away. I find that headphones are the best option
to keep me from getting distracted. Okay, check in number three. I think that I'm at a point
now where I'm really starting to see the value in this
in almost any way. Even when I don't have as much to say,
I think it's becoming a little easier for me to find something to say. I felt a lot better about doing morning
pages this week than I did last week. I was feeling really frustrated last week,
and I think it's because I wasn't in the right mindset
whenever I was sitting down. I was in this kind of impatient,
I just want to get this over with type mindset. And this week I really tried to make sure
that I was setting aside this time and being very intentional with
This is what I'm doing right now. And so it's a lot easier for me to sit
down and relax and not feel frustrated and not feel like this was a chore
or something that I had to do. I just enjoyed my time as I was doing it. All of this may sound like a lot of work and you may be thinking,
I don't have time for that. But the benefits far outweigh
the time used by getting up 30 minutes earlier, or by putting away
social media for an extra 30 minutes. You could be freeing up time for something
that will improve your whole day or in life. As many people claim. When Julia Cameron is asked why she writes morning pages,
she says to get to the other side, the other side of our fear,
our negativity, of our moods. There really are so many benefits
that come with writing morning pages, though, and I don't think
I could even list half of them. But I will tell you about some of the ones
that I experience the most. The first
and main benefit I had from morning pages is the clarity being able to dump
all of my noisy thoughts onto the page
made room for more important thoughts. This made my day feel way
less overwhelming, kind of like having a clean desk
to work at. The second benefit was problem
identification and solving. A lot of times I have a problem
lurking in the back of my head that is affecting my day,
but I either don't have a way to solve it or I don't even know what it is
so that I can solve it when I sit down and write stream of consciousness. The problem tends to reveal itself. The third benefit was the improvement
of my stress and anxiety. A lot of my worries
come from things that I can't change, but they still roll around in my brain
when I put them down on paper. It takes their power away sometimes. Once those anxieties are on the page,
I realize there's something that I won't even be
thinking about ten days from now. The anxiety shrink. They're way less consequential. The fourth
benefit is having a place to rant. I can be negative and complain if I need
to without affecting anyone else. And a lot of times, once I do that,
the pages hold up a mirror back at me. This provokes me to have grace when I need to or to examine
why those things are bothering me. With understanding comes
the ability to manage my emotions. I do think it's important to note,
however, that you don't want to develop a habit of complaining. So be careful
about making negative statements. My fifth benefit is productivity, decision
making and goal setting. One of my biggest problems
is being able to prioritize tasks. When your to do list is long
and just glaring at you, it's overwhelming to try and pick what you should do next. What I noticed with Morning Pages is that the most important things
were to repeat themselves in my writing. If there was something I was putting off,
I would be able to see that and start examining why. If I felt stuck,
I could debate my next step. I could debate the pros and cons
of something I was considering doing. Sometimes I would learn
that there is something that I've been wanting to try
that I've never considered before. Things tend to pop up in the pages
and urge you to give them a chance. Morning pages may hold insights and intuitions
that startle you. Typically, they puncture denial. That brings me to my next benefit,
which is discovering what I like
and what I don't like, crazy as it seems. Sometimes we don't know what we like. Sometimes we don't have an answer to how
we want to be spending our time. This can be in the broad sense,
as in feeling lost or looking for meaning and purpose. Or it could be smaller, like discovering you enjoy baking cookies
in the shape of cartoon characters. It's easy to be so wrapped up in our day
to day lives, our routines and our work to the point
that we don't even know what things bring us joy
and what things drain us. Once you realize that you keep talking
about cookies in your morning pages, you realize that you might want
to start making time to bake. Finally, the seventh benefit I got from morning
pages is creativity. Morning pages themselves are not art, but they do help us with art
and creativity indirectly. Although the content of morning pages
seems to have nothing to do with art, they often move us first to more
artful lives and then to art itself. This could be by quieting the inner critic
that keeps telling me I can't do something. Or because I'm being less analytic
with these pages, I'm able to be more imaginative,
almost like being a kid again. Also, as I mentioned earlier,
they help with discipline. In your creative practice. They help with creative blocks. They give you a chance to find new ideas. And since people are more creative
in the morning, getting up first thing in writing allows for more opportunities
to catch these new ideas. And that's how it feels
while you're writing morning pages. New ideas seemingly pop up on their own,
and you get to pluck them from the pages. The morning pages
teach logic brain to stand aside and let artists brain play. I could definitely go on longer
talking about the benefits of this simple exercise on your life,
but I will leave you with those seven. Definitely. Check out the first few chapters
of The Artist's Way book by Julia Cameron if you want to learn more. All right. It's been 30 days,
so this is my final check in. I can't say that these have been life
changing for me specifically. I know a lot of people call them that, but I will say that I plan to continue
to do these indefinitely. I think that they are very helpful
to my life. It has been great
for removing all that static in my brain, all those other thoughts
that I don't want to deal with all day so that I can just start focusing on the
things that I want to be creative with. It really is just so helpful
to get all of the noise out of your brain and get it down onto the paper so that you don't have to think about it
to open your brain up to all the creativity
that you can be doing. The prompts have been helpful. I have checked a few online and used those
and then I made my own list and those are things that I gravitate
towards writing about anyways in my morning pages. So it has been helpful
to just have that kind of specific focus for the day
of what I'm going to write about. What I have discovered over the past 30 days is that morning pages
clean out all the clutter in my brain. It's a personal and private way for me
to express myself without censorship. And because of that,
I am able to understand myself better what I like, what I don't like,
what I want, what I don't want. Morning pages
uncover interests and opinions and enthusiasms
that I didn't even know existed. It also helps reveal problems and then
sometimes answers to those problems. Morning pages are a tool for discovering where you are, where you want to go,
and how you want to get there. I highly recommend morning pages
for anyone, whether you're an artist or not, and I hope you give them
at least a 30 day chance if you are considering trying out
morning pages. I created a free prompt list
that I will link in the description. Thank you so much
for watching this video to the end. If you found it valuable and you'd like to support me,
don't forget to give it a like. And I hope you have
a great rest of your day.