I used to draw a lot. I have old sketchbooks filled with scribbles and thoughts and ideas. Looking back I think it contributed to my clarity and general superpowers! ;) Creating things freely, without worrying about conforming to rules or timeframes was great exercise for my brain. At the same time, practicing mental focus and attaining "Flow" or a zen-like state of consciousness of simply being in the moment and purely expressing myself, is an amazing state to attain. (It could also lead to run-on sentences). When you learn to get in to a state like that, it will improve your focus and clarity in anything you set your mind to.
In more recent years, a different phase of life I guess, I've spent more time working within specific parameters. Sometimes attaining "Flow", but usually not for long, as interruptions are frequent. There's been little unbridled, unbounded creativity. Just exploratory practice at anything for extended periods of time is difficult amid all the things requiring attention. Even my guitar, while I have improved over time, only gets picked up for a few minutes here and there. And because I'm trying to learn specific things with it, there's not a lot of freedom of expression. Actually the times I enjoy the guitar most in those short sessions is when I'm just goofing around, improvising over a blues song.
In an attempt to unlock my mind again, free my creativity once more and perhaps balance myself, I've put a sketch book in my pocket. The sketchbook mobile app for the iPhone has been fun to play with. It's been interesting getting used to drawing on a small screen with my fingers, but I'm getting the hang of finger painting with pixels. I'd never have called myself an artist, even at the height of my doodling days, but I'm going to start posting some of the things I create in this totally awesome app. I was always pretty shy with my drawings back then but hey, this is pretty fun and this is the digital age. It's easy to share with a million people I've never met, so anything here tagged with "doodles" will have something I've drawn. If I'm going to share my thoughts in words, I might as well share them in pictures too.
Here are a couple of first doodles, enjoy, comment, whatever.
First time playing with layers in this app. Like I said, I'm no artist, just let my fingers do the painting, playing around, getting used to the app.
Got ambitious with this one and also shelled out the couple bucks for the full version of Sketchbook.
Reference photo for this is my nephew, a Tattoo Artist in BC. Layers and brushes and details, oh my! Also a few hours up past my bed time.