Questions are one of the most powerful tools we have available to us. A great open-ended question can be the key to unlocking a whole undiscovered thread of ideas, reaching a fresh new insight on an old familiar issue, and understanding some part of ourselves and our creativity in a different way.

Here are 5 'Power Questions' to ask yourself to illuminate the inner workings of your creativity, and as a result give you a new level of awareness and surge of motivation.

Each question is followed by some further similar questions you can use around the same area to gain even more insight.

First, find some time and a quiet place to yourself, where you won't be interrupted.

Before you start, pick a particular creative medium or form that really love working in and be specific in describing it. For example you might use 'writing short romantic stories' rather than just 'writing' or 'photographing woodland wildlife' rather than simply 'photography'.

Get a pencil and paper and write out the answers and ideas that come to you, prompted by the questions below.

To get the most from this exercise, be open and honest with yourself throughout. Also don't worry about writing grammatically perfect logical sentences, just go with the thoughts that are presented and see what new insights you discover...

The 5 Power Questions

1. What do you really enjoy about creating? What in particular makes it such a pleasure? Is it the way it makes you feel, the environment you work in, the materials you use, the physical aspect, the mental aspect, the way you're seeking to communicate with others, the sense of freedom and release? Write as descriptively as you can and get to the fine detail of what exactly it is you love about creating in this way.

2. What would you tell other people was the greatest benefit about creating? What does it do for you more than anything else, how does it enhance your life? What does creating and being creative give you that nothing else in the world can fulfil or replace?

3. Who would you be if you didn't create? How would your life be different? How would your personality be different? As a percentage, how large a part of everything you do is directly connected with your using your creativity? This questions really gets to the crux of how fundamental a part of your identity and make-up is about being an actively creative person.

4. How would you feel if you were never able to create in this way again? If you were to suddenly lose all ability and opportunity to create in the ways you love, what effect would it have on your life, your outlook, and your personality? Ask this as you are now, knowing all the benefits creativity brings you, and then it being taken away, rather than try to imagine you'd never known at all what it's like to be creative.

5. What's your biggest motivational secret? What compels you to reach for the pen, the paints, the camera? What's the one thing that always inspires you to create? If you could sum up why you create in one sentence what would it be? We all have deep motivations to create and recognising and tapping into them helps us create more freely and easily.

These power questions can be used for different parts of your creativity or different media you create in. We can have different attitudes and relations to different forms we work in.

Experiment with them, get to know which really push a button or unlock a vital new awareness. Then ask yourself you can use this to enhance and increase your creativity even further.

? Copyright 2006 Dan Goodwin