Spring provides a wonderful time to learn to live more creatively. In the process of clearing stacks of old papers and magazines, I ran across this quote: “Use it up. Make it do. Wear it out.” It’s something our grandmothers believed in, and even makes sense in uncertain economic times today.

To live life more creatively, perhaps we can think of how something can be used differently, more efficiently, or put to better use in the hands of someone else. We often throw away things we no longer want. But it is a good feeling to know that before we get rid of something, it has totally fulfilled its purpose. Everything has a purpose, if not to us, then to someone else.

Living creatively, we take responsibility for things in our possession. Even if we do not have a lot of possessions, we are at least responsible for ourselves and experience abundance through appreciating what we have. Acknowledging the blessings in our lives helps us realize how truly blessed we are. If we are grateful for friendship, for example, we will have friends. So often the things we are grateful for multiply.

When we pay attention to the little things in life at the moment they come to our awareness, it often allows the big things to take care of themselves. Benjamin Franklin said watch your pennies, and the dollars will take care of themselves. This is the key to living creatively: take time to live in the moment, and wisely act on what it asks of you.

If you can see and act upon what is at hand, moment to moment, it opens you up to the vision of a greater reality. As William Blake said, “To see the world in a grain of sand, and a heaven in a wild flower, hold infinity in the palm of our hand and eternity in an hour.”

Barbara Basia Koenig is an Encinitas artist