On the creative journey, it's easy to get lost, but don't worry, you'll lift up.

Sometimes you just need a creative pep talk.

Hey, you're listening to the Creative Pep Talk podcast. I'm your host, Amy J.

Pizza. Do you currently or have you ever felt apathetic about your creative practice?

Like, feel stuck in it, feel like you're only making stuff when you can force yourself to sit down and create?

And at some point you feel like the only reason I wanted to have a creative practice at all is because I wanted to do this.

Now I'm having to force myself because I don't want to do it anymore. Have you ever felt like that?

I feel like that every once in a while in my creative practice, but I have noticed that there are a lot of times that I feel like that when I'm playing video games.

So right now, if you've been listening to the show for the past eight months or so, you've heard me nonstop talk about the game Elden Ring.

Elden Ring at one best game of the year, it's phenomenal. It's incredibly punishing.

It's a very difficult game. If you're not into that kind of difficult game, I wouldn't purchase it.

But I just love being punished like that. So I've almost racked up 200 hours on the game over the past eight months.

And I've just been obsessed. But that obsession, of course, has its ups and downs.

I'm not always as obsessed as the peak times when I'm all in and I want to stay up all night playing this game.

And I started thinking about what contributes to those ups and downs.

Why is it that sometimes I can't get enough and other times I'm almost at the risk of giving up and letting go of something that has the potential to give me so much fulfillment and joy.

And yes, I'm talking about Elden Ring and sure your creative practice.

But why? Why does it have been flow so much?

And I noticed that the times in which I am red hot for the game all have to do with having a clear sense of like this is what I'm doing.

This is why I'm doing it. This effort is what contributes to actually making a difference to beating that next boss or getting that new armor or leveling, getting an ancient dragon smithing somber smithing stone.

That one's for all, you know, the 10 people that listen to this that love that game. That's just for you. Everyone else is like, what the heck is he talking about.

But when I know what that goal is and I know why I'm doing this and what it's about what the effort is all about what I'm what it's contributing to.

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