PTCC #005: 🎨 Creative Rut? Here's the Cure
In the mail 📧
The story: Thoughts on how to snap out of a creative rut quickly.
Small ideas: Part-time creator ideas to ponder.
Web highlights: Tim Harford talks about creativity, creators talk about the benefits of having fewer dollars and we hear about the science of being creative.
Read time: 2 minutes
THE STORY
Creativity and invention
The wheel, the telephone, the nail, the compass, Penicillin and the internet. They are amongst some of the best inventions, inventions that changed the world and transformed lives.
The good news is, we’re not trying to come up with ideas that change the world, really, we’re just trying to consistently show up with something interesting to say.
Procrastination is junk food for the brain
In a 2013 study, science flipped what we understood about procrastination. Two scientists, Dr Pychyl and Dr Sirois wrote this about procrastination “the primacy of short-term mood repair … over the longer-term pursuit of intended actions.” I’m aware that sentence doesn’t make a tonne of sense. Here’s my interpretation.
You don’t want to sit and stare at a blank page convincing yourself you are quite obviously not smart enough to produce anything worth sharing, so you don’t. You procrastinate instead.
System override
The question then becomes how do you stop this constant need to feel good?
The answer is punishingly simple.
Each time you are faced with a creative rut, you must take action. I’ve learned to do this what feels like a million and one times over the last 2.5 years and these are the go-to questions tricks:
Fast forward 3 years, do I still want to be creating online?
Realising that one day, who knows when I won’t have the pleasure of debating this stuff. I’ll no longer be able to create.
If I’m honest, the last one is the one that makes me get out of bed in the morning, grab a coffee and start writing. The other option is to have too much to say.
Slow-motion multitasking
In 1905, Albert Einstein wrote 4 remarkable papers. Journalist and author Tim Harford caught on to Einstein and did a bit of digging. He reckons the answer to this creativity rut thing is to do multiple things at once. Yep, you heard me right. Stop doing one thing and do several but there’s a catch. You don’t do several at full speed ahead, you do several, slowly. He calls it ‘slow-motion multitasking’.
Having multiple things on the go and being able to dip back and forth between projects as you see fit is, maybe, the secret to producing great work consistently.
Action is the cure
But what we’re talking about really is the ability to create.
Creativity is just an extension of that word. We’re not talking about coming up with the best ideas in the world (altogether that would be nice) we’re talking here about the ability to produce. To take action. To have an output.
I’ve lost count of the times I sit down and type out complete rubbish. That stuff isn’t worth the virtual paper it’s written on. I tap away, knowing that the stuff I’m coming out with will get backspace eventually but that’s sort of the point.
The point is to stop creating for perfection. Bad ideas are the payment for good ideas.
SMALL IDEAS
🖥️ A change in environment might be exactly what you need to stop the creativity rut. Changing your workspace could double your productivity and creativity.
🌳 Getting outside might be the answer to your creative rut. If you want to get more creative, take a walk.
🚿 Taking a shower is the super-hack to creativity and here’s why.
WEB HIGHLIGHTS
Creator Andrew Gazdecki spits some truth about why limitations can force creativity, and rethinking the way you build your startup.
Tim Harford talks to us about the power of ‘slow-motion multitasking’.
Big Think tells us about how creativity actually works.
My new book is out now! : 100,000 Words — The Quiet Secrets to Building a Writing Practice Alongside Your 9–5 — grab your copy for $0.99!