Creativity in Magic
Over the years I have listened to many people speak or I have read about their tips on creativity. The best advice and what has always worked for me is to write your ideas down as soon as you think of them. Don't worry if it is just part of an idea sometimes ideas come in parts over time. For instance have you ever listened to music and thought it would be great in a magic act but you don't know exactly what act? It doesn't matter write it down. The rest may pop into your mind later.
People create this way all the time. Your inner vision of ideas will give you material that your mind doesn't. Look at it as your inner voice wants to tell you something. Even a very small creative idea is very important and the more you learn the more ideas you will be able to come up with. Let’s say you have a prop that locks with a padlock and you see a padlock for sale that is just perfect so you buy it and use it on your prop, that is creativity and the more you exercise your mind like that the more you will draw creativity out of yourself.
Thinking about ideas for a good period of time is important. Once you get a good idea out give your mind time to come up with more information about it and often details will come. The longer you study any subject the more information you have to create something new with. Some people say they can't create but I believe you only can't if you believe you can't. I believe you can create if you work at it. I think you can see it in acts. Even some standard magic acts have some twist and changes by the artist performing them and that is creativity. It is like a mouth coil as soon as you get a little out you can keep pulling and it will stream out.
I remember watching an artist who did rock sculpture. He would bring all sorts of different shaped rocks home and put them in his yard even though he didn't know what he was going to sculpture using that rock. He used his instinct to bring different rocks home and then he would look at them and in time he would get the idea he needed for a particular rock. Time is important in creativity. A whole idea might come all at once or it might come in parts and take a year to finish. There is a time to make effort to think of ideas and a time to stop and let the idea form itself within you. It takes work to be creative just like it takes work to do anything else.
You can do mental exercises by thinking about acts you see then think how would you do the act. What changes would you make? This is mental exercise to prime your creativity. But remember this in the world of show business you will not have an idea long if you talk about it. Keep it quiet until you are ready to write about it, perform it or sell it. The key to all of this is to write every idea down when they come and build yourself a road map of ideas. I have been writing my ideas down since I was a teenager.
-N. Bigelow
