Since I’ve been writing, I’ve started looking for inspiration everywhere. I find inspiration in music, in art, and I draw on my own personal life experiences. Having your senses fired by external stimuli, often fuels your creative process. Nevertheless, some days the words just won’t come. Life, with all its anxieties can drown out the Muse, if he’s still talking.

My life has been especially busy and my mind has been a very noisy and messy place. It feels a little like I can’t catch my breath. Maybe even like I’m under water, trying to claw back to the surface.  I can fix this, I know I can. Yet, I ignore my own advice.

It’s time to take a break and find some quiet time. For me, that means getting outside, no matter the weather. Walking the country roads past the crumbling old walls that line the pastures, I let my mind wander. There’s a fallen down barn on the dirt road about a mile away. The red-tailed hawks perch on the half-rotted beams and watch for field mice and rabbits in the tall grass. The wind sighing, the birds singing, the chatter of the squirrels is the only music to my ears. Cross the creek, rushing with last night’s rain. The smell of damp leaves, the mud, all loamy and decayed.

Even better, when the world is quiet after a new fall of snow. It crunches beneath your boots as your feet plunge through the sheen of ice on the surface. When the sun returns, it sparkles like a spray of tiny stars on a field of white instead of black. The air freezes your nostrils but it feels clean and purifying. The red of the cardinal is in sharp contrast to the brilliant white of the snow clinging to the tree branches.

Breathe it in deeply. Inspire… Now, to go home and write something beautiful.