Creativity Takes Courage: Dare to Think Differently (Flow)

It’s not always easy to be creative—to give our minds space to roam while ignoring our inner critic, to stare down a blank page and make the leap from nothing to anything. It takes courage.
    Finding the courage to create is something the editors of Flow know a lot about. Creativity is a central value of the Flow mission, evident in every issue that bursts with the wild imaginations of its artists, writers, and editors. In Creativity Takes Courage, Flow brings together inspiration, hands-on projects, boundary-pushing activities, and special paper goodies to show readers how to unleash their inner artists.     
    Organized around a series of twelve “dares”—including Dare to Fail, Dare to Be a Kid, Dare to Be Bored, Dare to Go Offline, Dare to Collaborate—Creativity Takes Courage encourages the reader to be fully present . . . and spend idle time staring out the window. To leave your comfort zone and start a project, without hesitation . . . and nourish yourself with museum visits and reading time. Each dare includes fill-in pages and prompts to go deeper into what motivates us or hinders us, like mindful questions to identify fears of failure, or a Dare to Commit notebook for recording both daily and weekly projects.
    It’s the illustrated and fully interactive gift of how to live more creatively and enjoy every minute of the process, no matter what the result.

Irene Smit and Astrid van der Hulst are the creative directors of Flow magazine, a popular international publication packed with paper goodies and beautiful illustrations celebrating creativity, imperfection, and life's little pleasures. Astrid and Irene began their magazine careers as editors at Cosmopolitan and Marie Claire. In 2008, inspired by their passion for paper and quest for mindfulness, Irene and Astrid dreamed up the idea for their own magazine in a small attic and haven't looked back since. They are also the authors of the bestselling A Book That Takes Its Time, The Tiny Book of Tiny Pleasures, Everything Grows with Love, and 50 Ways to Draw Your Beautiful, Ordinary Life. They each live with their family in Haarlem, Netherlands.