I’ve been reading David Kadavy’s The Heart to Start and recently found that I really want to do more of what I love. So much of my past year has been involved in reading, learning, and graphing my creative process.
Why “Just Make Things” Doesn’t Work For Me
I’m a Class A procrastinator. Tim Urban talked about procrastination in his TED Talk and the entire thing felt so true for me. He tapped into that subconcious of people like us that aren’t able to manifest their ideas consistently and have not understood how to change that pattern.
Observe the next time a water drop rolls down your car window. Once a path is set, most other drops seem to follow this path. This is how water works. This is also how our human machine works. Once we do a thing, we are more likely to do the same thing. In fact, it has gotten easier to do that same thing. Do it enough and we enter the space of routines and habits, which is another topic.
So if I have procrastinated before, if it is my pattern to think of an idea and falter in execution, what can change that?
Awareness of Your Process!
I read The Phoenix Project and the way they changed their process to work was first to visualize their work as a factory floor.
That’s my key, to get a good understanding of how I make things so that I can make better and more things.
In fact, the road to making better things seems to be via making more things. I read in David’s book that Ed Sheeran makes 5 songs a day when he is making an album.
Flow
When you get into the creating mood and the world dissolves around you to you doing your art, this is flow. Basketball players experience flow. Creatives experience flow. Coders experience flow. It is a state of doing where you are completely absorbed in the process of doing.
When you are in flow, you enjoy what you do more and the thing you make is better. So arguably, if you keep reaching flow when creating, you’ll create more and WANT to create more.
The question is, how do we get to and practice flow?
Creative Process
The steps by which you make a thing, the steps by which you sit yourself at the desk, the steps that thing goes through from concept to finished, these are all creative process in my head.
This includes rituals before even starting the day’s work, such as taking the name of one you Love, or sipping some green tea with ginger, or taking 1 minute to breathe mindfully, these are all part of a creative process.
When a comic I make starts, how I go from blank page to pencil to ink to color to finished, this is creative process.
All that I do to bring myself to the desk, and keep myself at the desk often and for protracted lengths of time, this is creative process.
My Story
As I’ve struggled with my own creative process, I’ve sought wisdom and guidance from books, videos, friends, colleagues, and the beyond.
What I will do is share what I’m learning, share my experiments, and learn and share what other creatives are doing regarding their creative process.
My love is to create. I love building things. If there are others like me who are passionate about building but feel like they are dragging their feet through the mud, I will write for them. As Scott Adams said, when I’m breaking out of this prison, I’m breaking all of us out!
So come with!