Psst … hey, Copyblogger is taking the week off between Christmas and New Year’s.
At least, officially.
I’m not supposed to be here at all.
But, given that my schedule is always out of whack this time of year, I like to take advantage of the disruptions to think about what I want to make happen in the coming year.
I talked a little bit before Christmas about some of my observations about productivity advice and why it can be tricky for creative pros.
Today I want to talk about one of my favorite productivity “hacks.” It’s the one tactic that serves me when everything else is on the express shuttle to Crazytown.
Like, um, the moment when I’m writing this post … between finishing baking the second pie for Christmas dinner and doing my hair so I can go to the neighbors’ place without frightening their children.
That lifesaver is a robust creative process. If you make anything creative on a consistent basis — blog posts, videos, podcast episodes — this will save you a ton of time, energy, and stress.
First: the starting ritual
Usually, the hardest part of creative work is getting started. I don’t know about you, but my brain likes to put off starting as long as possible. Partly because my brain likes plenty of mulling time, and partly because my brain is rather lazy.
There are a million little rituals you can devise to let your brain know, “OK, we’re starting some work now.”
You might go for a walk, or go catch a Pokémon, or make a cup of your favorite writing tea. Maybe you like to scribble a fast mind map, or burn a little incense at the altar of the writing gods.
Whatever starting ritual you choose, make it consistent. And when you fire it off, do anything you can humanly do to start writing … even if it’s literally a sentence or two.
The more you practice starting, the more work you’ll end up making.
The spark
This is the creative idea, the seedling that will grow up to be a piece of work.
This is where a lot of writers can get stuck, but there are two great secrets to generating creative ideas.
The first is that the more work you create, the more ideas you have. Ideas are like tribbles. Get a few of them together and they’re very good at making baby ideas.
The second is that no matter how creatively drained you might feel, you actually have plenty of ideas. Your brain sits there in your head making up ideas all day long. You just aren’t capturing and keeping them.
I recommend that part of your creative process should focus on that second…
