New Year, New You: Adding creative flair

WASHINGTON (Map, News) - Welcome back to our fifth week of the New Year, New You series! I hope that you’re busily embodying all of these tranquility-inducing tools. Taking the time to add a dose of creativity into your daily to-dos is sure to spice up your everyday. We’re all creative and express that creativity through daily choices: through words we choose, clothes we wear, food we eat, how we use our free time, how we design our work projects, and more. I’ve pulled together a few of my favorite tips to help you experience the joys of doing things differently with a dash of creative flair:

» Try Something New. Take up tango. Learn French. Skydive. Hike in the Shenandoah Mountains. Kayak. Travel to Tokyo. Take guitar lessons. Do yoga. Try meditation. Drink wheatgrass. Write a screenplay. Go see the latest exhibit at a local museum. Plant a windowsill herb garden.

» Get Crafty. Knit a scarf. Crochet a baby blanket. Bead a necklace. Paint a flower. Design a dress. Take a sewing class. Make a tablecloth. Blend your own scented bath salts. Cut up an old sweater and make the sleeves into leg warmers and the body into a belly warmer.

» Revamp Your Routine. Take a new route to work. Use colored pencils. Wear a different color. Get up earlier. Add in daily movement: dance, walk, bike. Sip organic tea instead of coffee. Pack a picnic for lunch and sit in the park. Whip up a new dish. Use flower-shaped Post-its.

Omwork

» Choose two of the tips — one that seems totally doable and one that scares you. Put them on your to-do list this week. I always encourage my yoga students to find their edge, that sacred place of sensation before pain. Exploring your comfort zone and stepping outside of it is sure to add doses of creative flair into your daily reality. Breathe deeply, create often and notice the rewards.

Kimberly Wilson is the founder of Tranquil Space Yoga and Tranquil Space Foundation.

Visit kimberlywilson.com.

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