darren r hill

the creative minimalist

I found myself thinking about how it is perfectionism created by myself, which, ironically, destroys my creativity. This week’s vlog examines how I must embrace the unknown and let creativity flow.
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Hello worlds! I have found myself in a creative rut, my creativity has become automated and feels unnatural. This week’s vlog is all about beginning to rewild my imagination and creativity.
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Hello worlds! I made a video for my song “We’re not Actors” from the album “The Same Old Fear”.
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This week’s vlog looks at how we may need to change our minds or opinions to get truly creative. And it all starts with the question, when was the last time you changed your mind?
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Month end gives me a pause for reflection to review what is helping and hindering my creative journey. My latest vlog looks at the helps and hindrances to a creative life from my own recent experience.
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Elections, wars, rumours of wars, and AI developments all add to uncertainty in the creative ether. Our creative sponge-like souls can struggle in times of uncertainty. In this week’s vlog, I offer a few solutions, or soulutions, to help us remain creative during these times.
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Full – Weekly Creative Prompt
It’s time for another weekly creative prompt word. These weekly words, or prompts, are to give me, and anyone else who wants to join in, some focus to our creative work.

Later on this week the moon reaches its brightest moment of its lunar cycle. On Thursday, there is a full moon. Anyone who has followed this blog for a while will know I like to use the moon in my planning rituals and I am fascinated by our local satellite. Therefore…

This week’s creative prompt word is:

Full — containing or holding as much or as many as possible; having no empty space:

this isn’t the only definition of the word but striving to be the creative minimalist, the phrase ‘having no empty space’ resonated

Let the prompt inspire you in any area of creativity that you are interested:
- writing fiction
- art journaling
- songwriting
- journaling
- photography
- painting
- composing
- blog posts
- art therapy
- anything that could use a little nudge to begin
I now have ‘full’ written on the board above my computer. I am confident it will inspire me on my creative journey this week. Furthermore, I can already feel it impinging on how I create my music and how I play in my journal.

As mentioned before, this isn’t a ‘challenge’ but the prompts can be used that way if you want. If you do create anything using them, I would love to see or hear about it. Leave a link in the comments below or tag me @darrenrhill or #thecreativeminimalist on any social platform.

Thank you for reading this post. Please share your thoughts in the comment section below.
namaste
d
xox

If you enjoyed this post please support my writing by making a donation of any amount.

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24 January 2021
Friday Fiction Writing Prompt exploring shade
A Fiction Writing Prompt to stretch the literary muscles. No rules. No word counts. Simply write and explore.

It was subtle, but it was there. The red carpet was stained. From a certain angle, the darker shade was clear.

Writing Prompt Expanded

We live in a universe of cause and effect. If we do something, then something happens. It’s why time flows forward for us. And, unfortunately, we can’t at this present time, change that. This week’s creative prompt was shade and so that’s being explored in this writing exercise. Although geared more to fiction, you can easily use this as a journal or self-care prompt: what causes and effects do you need to think about in your life?

To begin you need to explore why the carpet is marked and then decide what you are going to do about it.
- What caused the stain?
- Was it expected?
- What are you going to do?
There are two obvious possibilities that you might want to explore. I did make them pretty unsubtle with the wording of the prompt. A red carpet: could it be blood or could it be wine? But you don’t have to go down the obvious route, in fact, the real creative challenge for writers is to explore the unexpected.

As always these writing prompts are optional and entirely open to your interpretation. Use them as a starting point for a short story or something a little more grandiose. If you do write something, please share it or a link, in the comments, use the hashtag #ffwp or tag me @darrenrhill. I’d love to read what you create. Write and enjoy the learning process.

Original carpet image by Engin Akyurt from Pixabay

Thank you for reading this post. Please share your thoughts in the comment section below.
namaste
d
xox

If you enjoyed this post please support my writing by making a donation of any amount.

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22 January 2021
Shade – Weekly Creative Prompt
It’s time for another weekly creative prompt. These weekly prompts are to give me, and anyone else who wants to join in, some focus to our creative work.

The first creative prompt was ‘light’ and this week’s prompt is related. We see colour because of light. And light enables us to see colour in all its varieties, which leads me to the prompt.

This week’s creative prompt word is:

Shade — a colour, especially about how light or dark it is or as distinguished from one nearly like it

there are other meanings, but I loved the idea of something being distinguished from another nearly like it

Let the prompt inspire you in any area of creativity that you are interested:
- writing fiction
- art journaling
- songwriting
- journaling
- photography
- painting
- composing
- blog posts
- art therapy
- anything that could use a little nudge to begin
I now have ‘shade’ written on the board above my computer. I am confident it will inspire me on my creative journey this week. At the very least, it will remind me that things are rarely black and white, there are colours and there is shade.

As mentioned before, this isn’t a ‘challenge’ but the prompts can be used that way if you want. If you do create anything using them, I would love to see or hear about it. Leave a link in the comments below or tag me @darrenrhill or #thecreativeminimalist on any social platform.

Thank you for reading this post. Please share your thoughts in the comment section below.
namaste
d
xox

If you enjoyed this post please support my writing by making a donation of any amount.

Sign up for my (ir)regular newsletter to keep up to date with my creative adventures, including special offers, and join me on Instagram | YouTube | Twitter | Pinterest
17 January 2021
Hope in myself

This week I have had the word ‘hope’ above my desk. It is my creative prompt for the week. The creativity has been a bit scarce, so I’m not certain if it has helped.

However, I did open the journal and write and doodle and think around ‘hope’. It was, as always, an interesting time, exploring an idea and concept in the journal. The ability to step back and think about things is the reason I journal. And the blank page is the ideal place to just explore and see where an idea or thought will take me.

Today I ended up realising that my biggest hope at the moment should be to believe in myself. I should believe in my abilities and skills and creativity. To believe in myself is to actually be myself, my true self; to believe and be.

Sometimes this feels so close. All I need to do is climb over a little ledge before me. At other times it feels like I need to cross a chasm. And it is a chasm that feels too wide. In fact, so wide I can’t really tell if there is another side, it is obscured in the darkness or by the mist.

But I hope. I hope that I will believe in myself. That I will be. And I hope that you can be the person you need to be. Explore what you hope for in your journal, you never know how close your hopes might be to being realised. Take care my friends x.

Thank you for reading this post. Please share your thoughts in the comment section below.
namaste
d
xox

If you enjoyed this post please support my writing by making a donation of any amount.

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16 January 2021
Friday fiction writing prompt exploring Hope
A Fiction Writing Prompt exploring hope to stretch the literary muscles. No rules. No word counts. Simply write and explore.

If only…

Writing Prompt Expanded

This is the shortest prompt that I have ever shared and yet, it is also the most open. My general creative prompt for this week is hope. I’ve been looking for signs of hope as I have been working away. So often, especially in the current situation of the pandemic and general uncertainty, I have found myself saying, ‘if only this’ or ‘if only that’, then there would be hope. And so, that is why those words form this week’s Friday Fiction Writing Prompt.

This prompt is all about something that would bring hope. It is completely open to your interpretation. I have put a few ideas below but do let your creative imagination run free.

If only…
- a miracle cure was discovered
- there was enough money for…
- this winter would end
- I could find…
- the phone would ring
As always these writing prompts are optional and entirely open to your interpretation. Use them as a starting point for a short story or something a little more grandiose. If you do write something, please share it or a link, in the comments, use the hashtag #ffwp or tag me @darrenrhill. I’d love to read what you create. Write and enjoy the learning process.

Thank you for reading this post. Please share your thoughts in the comment section below.
namaste
d
xox

If you enjoyed this post please support my writing by making a donation of any amount.

Sign up for my (ir)regular newsletter to keep up to date with my creative adventures, including special offers, and join me on Instagram | YouTube | Twitter | Pinterest
15 January 2021
Hope – Weekly Creative Prompt
I’ll be honest, the first weekly creative prompt and all the surrounding thinking, from here, didn’t really happen. I managed to let it inspire my Wordless Wednesday but beyond that, there was no music and no real writing. However, I’m not one to give up so soon, so as we move into the second week of 2021 we have a second weekly creative prompt.

I’m going to remain positive, both with the concept and with the prompt. There is far too much negative thought and energy around at the moment. Therefore, the prompt shouldn’t take you, or me, down any darkened alleyways of despair — although creative expression knows no barriers. We can at least begin positively.

This week’s creative prompt word is:

“hope” — a feeling of expectation and desire for a particular thing to happen…

and the thesaurus adds… an aspiration, desire, wish, expectation, ambition, aim, plan, dream, daydream, longing, yearning, craving, hankering…

Let the prompt inspire you in any area of creativity that you are interested:
- writing fiction
- art journaling
- songwriting
- journaling
- photography
- painting
- composing
- blog posts
- art therapy
- anything that could use a little nudge to begin
I have ‘hope’ written on the board above my computer. I am confident it will inspire me on my creative journey this week. At the very least, it will remind me that there is more to life than the current events shared on the news.

As mentioned before, this isn’t a ‘challenge’ but the prompts can be used that way if you want. If you do create anything using them, I would love to see or hear about it. Leave a link in the comments below or tag me @darrenrhill or #thecreativeminimalist on any social platform.

Thank you for reading this post. Please share your thoughts in the comment section below.
namaste
d
xox

If you enjoyed this post please support my writing by making a donation of any amount.

Sign up for my (ir)regular newsletter to keep up to date with my creative adventures, including special offers, and join me on Instagram | YouTube | Twitter | Pinterest
10 January 2021