5 Best Ways To Use Cannabis For Creativity

By Shawn Gold, Founder PilgrimSoul.com

Cannabis has different effects on different people.

But what about the creative effects?

Cannabis has various natural chemical properties in the form of cannabinoids and terpenes that enhance the mind's mechanics.

With creative thinking, there is a rich history in the behavior and practices of creative geniuses and the moderate use of cannabis.

It comes as no surprise that creative geniuses from all backgrounds like Lewis Carrol, William Butler Yeats, Louis Armstrong, Steve Jobs, and Maya Angelou, all used cannabis to enhance their work, productivity, and creative output.

Using cannabis with creative intent

Research continually suggests that cannabis, when dosed correctly, can help incline the mind towards divergent thinking, imagination and more free-flowing processes of thought.

Essentially, cannabis stimulates frontal lobe activity and un-inhibits the mind to promote creative flow and other specific thought patterns tied to the creative process.

Creative Flow, a mental state of being where you are completely present and fully immersed in a task, is a byproduct of divergent thinking.

It’s this flow state that allows people to focus intensely, openly imagine, and connect seemingly unrelated ideas to develop new, creative solutions to problems.

While creative thinking mostly depends on the overall established creative purpose, specific strains of cannabis can help people enter the different subsections of creative thinking:

• Creative Imagination
• Creative Focus
• Creative Awareness
• Creative Connection
• Creative Reflection

From a scientific perspective, specific doses of cannabis enhance divergent thinking by stimulating blood flow to the brain's frontal lobe allowing neurons to fire in a more uninhibited way.

But cannabis is also a creative maximizer in how it deactivates specific areas of the brain. After all, one of the biggest inhibitors to creative ideation and divergent thinking is in judging ideas as they emerge. 

The brain's portion known as the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (DLPFC) is often associated with inhibition, self-censorship, and the cognitive control of emotions.

By slowing this area in the brain, imagination and divergent thinking can occur in a more judgment-free mindset. 

Cannabis is one of many tools which people use to achieve desired levels of creative flow, however it takes practice.

Pay attention to dosage

In using cannabis effectively for creative thinking, it is essential to pay close attention to one's initial dosage.

Since everyone's tolerance to THC ranges, the most practical dosing method involves beginning at a lower THC dose and building up from there over time.

In contrast, studies suggest that an initial high dosage of THC is linked to impaired divergent thinking and higher levels of anxiety and paranoia.

THC's initial low dose promotes open-mindedness, ideation, and the overall cognitive functions needed for creative thinking.

Through the proper dosage and usage of cannabis, here are five areas of focus to help maximize creative thinking.

#1) CREATIVE IMAGINATION 

Cannabis usage often results in a shift in how users perceive the world.

Since cannabis has the ability to open the mind and to make people more receptive to outside signals, cannabis users can find themselves with an enhanced capacity for imagination.

For example, while high, chefs report being able to taste the combinations of food better to plan and produce future recipes.

Meanwhile, musicians depict a newfound ability to imagine melodies being played by various instruments at once.

The usage of cannabis for creative imagination will increase a person’s capacity for judgment-free thinking, imagination, and sensory perception.

Here is a list of creative-energizing strains meant to help bring the onset of Creative Imagination.

#2) CREATIVE FOCUS 

Similar to how cannabis can un-inhibit the mind, specific cannabis strains or cultivars reveal the ability to unleash a strong sense of hyper-focus and attention among users.

These strains of cannabis are perfect for people who continuously find their minds racing and are prone to having difficulty paying attention.

In this way, scientists, writers, and deep thinkers are using cannabis to help lock in on a single concept, person or idea.

Using cannabis for creative focus allows scientists and deep thinkers to better detect, understand, and deconstruct patterns. Creative Focus allows deep thinkers to ruminate on a problem and to identify specific solutions.

The proper dosage of these cannabis strains can help users remain in the present and inspire creative problem-solving.

Here is a list of creative-euphoric strains meant to help bring the onset of Creative Focus. 

#3) CREATIVE AWARENESS 

Cannabis can elevate the mind and help people gain a stronger sense of awareness, especially in their surroundings.

Cannabis cultivars that promote creative awareness our particularly enjoyable when going to a museum or concert as these altered states open the mind’s aperture, allowing one to take in the experience with greater intensity.

The sense of awareness is not limited to visuals and objects but rather to the people around you. Cannabis usage for Creative Awareness enhances and deepens the empathetic connections.

Writers who use cannabis for Creative Awareness find themselves better able to enter their characters' different perspectives and feelings.

Visual artists, meanwhile, experience a hyper-alertness to aesthetics, colors, and artistic patterns.

Here is a list of creative-uplifting strains meant to help bring the onset of Creative Awareness. 

#4) CREATIVE CONNECTION 

Not to be confused with Creative Focus, the usage of cannabis for Creative Connection often involves enhancing the thought process of making non-linear connections.

Coined by Einstein as “combinatory play”, it is the strategic analysis of data, facts, and available material to determine new associations that are useful for solving the problem at hand.

Cannabis usage for Creative Connection strengthens the ability to connect seemingly unrelated concepts, objects, or ideas.

In other words, Creative Connection is the utilization of both convergent and divergent thinking to solve a problem. It allows people to 'see the bigger picture' in the same way that an orchestra's composer understands how all the various instruments fit together to make a single harmony.

#5) CREATIVE REFLECTION

Cannabis usage for Creative Reflection often results in empathy, distant-memory recall, and self-discovery.

This usage of cannabis allows people to meditate and self-reflect, to peel back the ego on a journey of introspection. The creative mindfulness associated with Creative Reflection helps people to better identify their typical behavioral patterns, both good and bad.

Creative Reflection can also provide people with the insight to understand where their emotions are coming from to build upon existing empathy skills.

Cannabis can also help promote distant-memory recall, ultimately leading people to their voilà moment during their self-discovery journeys. For instance, artists who use cannabis for Creative Reflection, can better tap into their emotions to draw from memory.

Here is a list of creative-calming strains meant to help bring the onset of Creative Reflection. 

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