The Creative Habit

One of the world's leading creative artists, choreographers, and creator of the smash-hit Broadway show, Movin' Out, shares her secrets for developing and honing your creative talents—at once prescriptive and inspirational, a book to stand alongside The Artist's Way and Bird by Bird. All it takes to make creativity a part of your life is the willingness to make it a habit. It is the product of preparation and effort, and it is within reach of everyone. Whether you are a painter, musician, businessperson, or simply an individual yearning to put your creativity to use, The Creative Habit provides you with thirty-two practical exercises based on the lessons Twyla Tharp has learned in her remarkable thirty-five-year career. In "Where's Your Pencil?" Tharp reminds you to observe the world—and get it down on paper. In "Coins and Chaos," she gives you an easy way to restore order and peace. In "Do a Verb," she turns your mind and body into coworkers. In "Build a Bridge to the Next Day," she shows you how to clean the clutter from your mind overnight. Tharp leads you through the painful first steps of scratching for ideas, finding the spine of your work, and getting out of ruts and into productive grooves. The wide-open realm of possibilities can be energizing, and Twyla Tharp explains how to take a deep breath and begin.

Twyla Tharp, one of America's greatest choreographers began her career in 1965, and has created more than 130 dances for her company as well as for the Joffrey Ballet, the New York City Ballet, the Paris Opera Ballet, London's Royal Ballet, Denmark's Royal Ballet, and American Ballet Theatre. She has won two Emmy Awards for television's Baryshnikov by Tharp, and a Tony Award for the Broadway musical Movin' Out. The recipient of a MacArthur Fellowship, she was inducted into the American Academy of Arts & Sciences in 1993 and was made an honorary member of the American Academy of Arts and Letters in 1997. She holds nineteen honorary degrees, most recently from Harvard University. She lives and works in New York City.

CONTENTS 1 I Walk into a White Room 2 Rituals of Preparation 3 Your Creative DNA 4 Harness Your Memory 5 Before You Can Think out of the Box, You Have to Start with a Box 6 Scratching 7 Accidents Will Happen 8 Spine 9 Skill 10 Ruts and Grooves 11 An "A" in Failure 12 The Long Run Acknowledgments