“Every child is an artist. The problem is how to remain an
artist once he grows up.”
Pablo Picasso

If you were in my cozy little office with me right now as I pen this post, you’d see lots of little knickknacks everywhere: angels, little porcelain and crystal dogs, shells, stones, and more (see my post Neatnik Nightmare). You’d also see toys — lots of them: a kaleidoscope, several gaily colored balls, two snow globes (one Christmas bear, one Easter bunny), a Santa finger puppet, a wooden top, Snoopy sitting at a typewriter, two trolls with wild hair. I’ll stop here!

Sometimes, I’m so involved in my writing that I forget about these little treasures, but every once in a while I pick one up and indulge the little girl in me for a bit. Doing this always makes me smile. It also reminds me how vital it is for us as writers and aspiring writers to stay in touch with the joyful enthusiasms, playfulness, and creative abandon that we embraced so naturally as children.

The great French poet Charles Baudelaire once said, genius is “nothing more or less than childhood recovered by will, a childhood now equipped for self-expression with an adult’s capacities.” Definitely food for thought!

We can recover the energy and joy of our inner child at any moment — they’re always waiting for us. One of the easiest ways to do this is to rediscovering things you loved to do as a child. When Carl Jung experienced a deep inner crisis after his break with Sigmund Freud, he dealt with this troubling moment in his life by returning to his childhood passion for building things. By reconnecting with his inner child, he also reconnected with his source of inspiration and passion. This helped him find the strength to express his own unique vision and share it with the world. Just imagine if we all built some time to dream and play into our work schedule every day — who knows what magic carpet might arrive on our doorstep!