Some people are incredibly creative and productive. I’m thinking of Mark Morris,  Robert Lepage,   Steve Martin,  Arianna Huffington and Oprah Winfrey, for example. If you’re not quite there yourself, you might be wondering, “What’s their secret?”

It’s easy to get caught up in bad thinking patterns or counterproductive behaviours; sometimes, you find yourself surrounded by the wrong kinds of people.  All of these will interfere with the free flow of your creativity.

If you make a few adjustments to your attitude and behaviour and in your dealings with other people, you can go from feeling stuck, blocked or unmotivated to being in the flow, super-productive, free to express your authentic vision and able to fulfill your utmost potential.

Here are my ten tips for completely unblocking your creativity:

1: Connect with supporters; disconnect from haters. Supportive people will encourage you to keep going when you’re tired, discouraged or can’t see a solution to the problem at hand. They’ll constantly affirm you and remind you to believe in yourself.

Hateful people will undermine your confidence, sabotage your success and convince you to give up on your goals. They’ll make you feel small, stupid and unworthy. Identify them quickly and get away from them as soon as you can.

2: Take time to daydream and play. Amazing ideas arise when you just let your mind wander freely, explore without an agenda, and make space for inspiration to come in. These moments are essential if you want to be fully creative.

3: Silence the negative self-talk. Listen for the voice in your head that’s telling you that you can’t, shouldn’t or don’t deserve to go for it and work on silencing it. Your new motto should be, “I can do it. Why not me?”

4: Work smarter not harder. It’s easy to waste your time on unnecessary, fruitless activities. Start being more efficient. Eat right, rest well, conserve your energy and focus on the areas where you’ll get the maximum pay-off.

5: Absorb the kind critiques; reject the cruel ones. Kind people will have valuable, constructive feedback for you; cruel ones will try to bully you into quitting.

It’s easy enough to tell who’s kind and who’s cruel. Take in all the feedback from the former and apply it to your process. It will take you far. Reject every bit of feedback from the latter and you’ll be spared a lot of grief. Everything you need to know, you’ll learn from the kind people.

6: Stop seeking approval. In order to be free to express your unique vision, you must detach from the opinions of others.  Kind people, even if they don’t like (or understand) your work, will never try to shut you down; cruel people will always do so, but that’s always a reflection on them.

If you want to unblock your creativity, your motto should be, “Who cares what other people think?” It’s not about being antisocial; it’s about letting go of your attachment to external reactions and concentrating on being true to yourself.

7: Tell the truth. If you’re self-censoring or trying to produce something you think the public or the critics want, your work will never be authentic or exciting. You might as well be real, and tell the truth as you see it.

Your energy will flow more freely and your work will be more compelling if you let yourself express what’s inside of you. Love it or hate it, everyone will recognize your output as genuine and if nothing else, you’ll be respected for your integrity.

8: Always do you. Instead of comparing yourself to others, strive to be the best version of yourself. No-one else sees things the way you do or can express themselves in the unique way that you can.

Your job is always to try to be your best self, and nothing else. When you focus on being a better and better you (instead of emulating someone else), you’re on your way to greatness.

9: Value process over progress. When it’s just about the goal, you become less present in the moment and miss out on the joy of the process.

If your goal is elusive, you can become despondent and feel like giving up. If, however, you focus on the experience of doing the work, you’ll find that the enjoyment, learning and challenges of the process will motivate you to keep on going and eventually, you’re likely to achieve something amazing.

10: Transform failure into opportunity. If you want to be truly creative, you’ll have to let go of your old ideas about “failure,” and start seeing it as an opportunity for growth and learning. Instead of letting setbacks slow you down or stop you, rethink the meaning of failure and transform it into fuel for your process.

These are my ten tips for unblocking your creativity and fulfilling your potential. What’s keeping you from getting to them right now?