Fearless Creating: A Step-by-Step Guide To Starting and Completing Your Work of Art [Paperback]

Eric Maisel (Author)

Book Description

Release date: October 17, 1995

For writers, painters, or performers in any field, new hope for overcoming creative blocks and finishing the art of their dreams.

The blank page, empty canvas, or uncarved stone will often fill artists with dread. But so may the thought of finishing, showing, or even selling their work. It is in this "artistic anxiety" that creative blocks begin.

With an understanding that could only be gained through years of experience in counseling artists, writers, and performers, Eric Maisel, Ph.D. discusses each stage of creation-wishing, choosing, starting, working, completing, selling--and the anxieties particular to each. He then shows how these inhibiting tensions can be turned to artistic advantages, how truth and beauty arrive in the work of art precisely because, and only when, anxiety has been understood, embraced, and resolved.

Fearless Creating guides the reader, whether an experienced artist or someone just starting out, past the pitfalls that appear in each stage of the process. By following Dr. Maisel's exercises related both to the world at hand and the ongoing struggles of artistic life, readers will emerge from this book with a completed work of art and a new perspective on their potential to be a fearless creator.

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

Besides being a writer himself, Eric Maisel is a therapist with a practice centered around artists, writers and performers and has seen many of the demons that haunt the creative life firsthand. In this inventive workbook, he comes up with many exercises designed to help you blast through your own inertia and fear, to get you back to the typewriter, the easel, or on the stage where you belong.

About the Author

A featured speaker at writers’ conferences and a regular contributor to Writer’s Digest, psychotherapist Eric Maisel has written twenty-two works of fiction and nonfiction including The Creativity Book, Deep Writing, A Life in the Arts, Fearless Creating, and Affirmations for Artists. He lives near San Francisco.

Product Details

• Paperback: 304 pages
• Publisher: Tarcher (October 17, 1995)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0874778050
• ISBN-13: 978-0874778052
• Product Dimensions: 9 x 0.8 x 7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (25 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #107,974 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Eric Maisel, Ph.D., widely regarded as America's foremost creativity coach, is the author of more than 40 books. His titles include Making Your Creative Mark, Coaching the Artist Within, The Van Gogh Blues, Fearless Creating, Mastering Creative Anxiety, Creativity for Life, A Writer's Paris, A Writer's San Francisco, and many others.

In addition to training creativity coaches, leading workshops nationally and internationally, and maintaining an individual creativity coaching practice, Dr. Maisel is in the forefront of the movement to rethink mental health. He writes the Rethinking Psychology blog for Psychology Today and among his books in this area are Rethinking Depression and Natural Psychology: the New Psychology of Meaning.

Dr. Maisel leads Deep Writing workshops at workshop centers like Esalen, Kripalu, Omega, Hollyhock and Rowe and in locales like San Francisco, New York, London, Paris, Prague and Rome. His books have been translated into more than a dozen languages, he has conducted hundreds of interviews, and his print column "Coaching the Artist Within" appears monthly in Professional Artist Magazine.

Dr. Maisel is also interested in the challenges that smart people face. His forthcoming book Why Smart People Hurt appears from Conari Press Fall of 2013. Dr. Maisel's websites are www.ericmaisel.com and www.naturalpsychology.net. He can be contacted at [e-mail].

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

112 of 115 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Best book on the creative process! May 1, 1999

By Joan Mazza

Format:Paperback

I've read many books on creativity and Eric Maisel describes it as no one else has. FEARLESS CREATING takes you through the steps of the creative process, predicts the typical anxieties and pitfalls, and offers specific suggestions to get past them. I especially liked his explanation for attending to your rhythms as your work and distinguishing between needed quiet time and using quiet to avoid the inevitable anxiety of creating.

As an author, I found Maisel's principles and advice to resonate with my experience. Working on an outline for my next book as I read, I found the book inspirational and fun as well as reassuring. If you liked Julia Cameron's THE ARTIST'S WAY, you'll love this book as much as I did.

I am recommending it to all my creative friends.

85 of 86 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars As a professor of creativity this has been 1 of 2 texts I have used for over 10 years. January 6, 2006

By Performing Arts Prof

Format:Paperback

I teach Creativity at a University so I am constantly on the lookout for new and improved texts to use in my courses. For over ten years I have used this same book because I have not found a better one.

I give the students a choice between this and Julia Cameron The Artist's Way. The latter is more "spiritual" in tone ("inner" this and "within" that, and let your "higher self" speak, etc.) and Fearless Craeting is more "secular" ( the occasional PG swear word, painting naked, etc.) so they appeal to different types of students. They are still the 2 best books I know to actually enhance your creativity. (Nor have the authors in my opinions, surpassed them in their subsequent books.)

The only drawback is that the student only have to pay $15.00 for this text. They are used to paying $95.00 so this can be upsetting to them.

61 of 64 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Puts action in your creative traction March 15, 2004

By QuinnCreative VINE™ VOICE

Format:Paperback|Amazon Verified Purchase

Maisel knows artists, whether they are writers, painters, dancers, musicians. And he knows what makes us tick, get stuck, frightened and give up. And he won't let us use a shred of an excuse. Thank goodness. Here is a book for the artist who wants to make meaning in life, work deep and see results. And while we are getting real, Maisel is there helping us plan, sell, and make money at it as well. Not for the faint of heart, or those who expect to be told that everything we do is wonderful and we are misunderstood. Wait, I take some of that back. This IS a book for the faint of heart, but not if you want to stay that way. This is a book for artists who are serious, who want to grow, who want to move forward every day. Maisel is never cruel, never patronizing, never so tough that you want to give up. This is a wonderful supportive book that makes you glad you decided NOT to make art your hobby while you got a "real" job. Maisel's book is filled with steps and exercises you can use for years, appreciating their flexibility as you do so.

28 of 28 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars a compelling book that is compassionate and forthright October 17, 2000

By A Customer

Format:Paperback

Maisel's Fearless Creating articulates the stages of the creative process in a unique way that shows that he really understands what is in the heart and mind of creators. His exercises are to the point, useful, and sometimes very funny, but even more important than the exercises is the author's vision, which is clear and accurate. He doesn't mince words about the difficulties creators face, both from within and from without, which must have upset the last reviewer to such an extent that she couldn't continue past the introduction. Too bad. Although Maisel is honest, that honesty is a virtue and he also provides answers and real help in every chapter. This is a must-own book for people who create or who hope to create.

33 of 34 people found the following review helpful

4.0 out of 5 stars A sophisticated look at the creative process June 14, 2001

By "[e-mail]"

Format:Paperback

As a coach, I work with a lot of artists (writers, actors, musicians), and this is the book I consistently recommend to them. The Artists Way is good for getting you launched, but it doesn't address the nuts and bolts challenges that you face if you want to make an income or regularly produce finished works of art. This books really looks at all aspects of being a producing artist from start to finish. It helps you pinpoint where in the process you may be getting stuck and gives concrete steps you can take to move forward.

24 of 25 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Excellent, brave April 26, 2005

By Allseasons

Format:Paperback|Amazon Verified Purchase

I am impressed at Maisel's boldness of style and content. He is not afraid to probe the depths of the human tendency to make excuses, play it safe, take the easy way out. He offers tough-minded encouragement in overcoming these near-universal blocks to originality and creativity, in art and in life. The exercises are interesting and useful, although of course some will be more relevant than others for each individual practitioner. I wouldn't judge in advance which ones are best, though; sometimes the least appealing is the most needed. Not for those who find creativity easy and straight-forward (which often means they aren't pushing their limits, which is fine if that's how they want to play it), but they probably wouldn't buy it anyway.

27 of 29 people found the following review helpful

4.0 out of 5 stars Maisel's ""Fearless Creating" helpful, thorough April 25, 2004

By A Customer

Format:Paperback

Eric Maisel's "Fearless Creating" is thorough and tough-minded, brooking no excuses for failure to start and follow-through the creative work, yet gently tolerant of the blocked artist's vulnerabilities and limitations. The book's only shortcoming is the silliness of some of the exercises, but this is easy to overlook in view of the book's overall helpfulness. It will be especially useful to the reader who resists the New Age, spiritual approach common to the genre.