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    Getting Creative: Developing Creative Habits That Work
    Getting Creative: Developing Creative Habits That Work
    Getting Creative: Developing Creative Habits That Work
    Ebook103 pages1 hour

    Getting Creative: Developing Creative Habits That Work

    By Drew Kimble

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    About this ebook

    Plan. Fail. Repeat.

    How exactly does anyone have the time and energy to work on their creative projects after coming home from work, catching up on chores, and putting the kids to bed?

    Do these people really have more time and energy than the rest of us, or were they were simply born with more self-discipline and motivation?

    Maybe they stumbled on some secret system that not only gives them the opportunity, but also the energy to create their art. Or maybe this is all just a bunch of crap that we tell ourselves in order to make us feel better.

    Creativity isn’t as easy as it looks

    Unfortunately, creativity isn’t some type of switch that you can simply turn on and off at random moments throughout the day. Sitting down to write isn’t like throwing in a load of laundry or checking your email, where if you have a few spare minutes, you can still get something accomplished. You need to plan for creativity.

    In Getting Creative, you'll discover:

    - Why being motivated and having self-discipline isn’t enough

    - Understanding what habits can (and can’t) do for you 

    - How to find and use your creative triggers

    - Successfully managing your creative environment

    - Why setting big goals for yourself is often a mistake

    - How to hold yourself accountable without beating yourself up

    Are you ready to get started?

    Creativity is a habit like flossing your teeth—you either do it, or you just talk about doing it. Sure it would be great if we all had all the time and resources to do whatever we wanted to do, but that’s rarely the way life operates, so we just have to do what we can with what we’ve got.

    Sometimes you have to get creative to develop creative habits that work.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherDrew Kimble
    Release dateAug 2, 2017
    ISBN9781386822073
    Getting Creative: Developing Creative Habits That Work

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      Book preview

      Getting Creative - Drew Kimble

      PLAN. FAIL. REPEAT

      It’s 5:30 on a cold Tuesday morning in February.

      Your alarm clock goes off, but you stay motionless under your comforter, hoping that it will turn itself off. Last night you promised that you would get up and go to the gym before work, but all you can think about right now is staying wrapped up in your warm cocoon and getting another 45 minutes of sleep.

      Or maybe it’s 9:00 in the evening. You just put the kids down to bed, and the house is finally quiet. Earlier you promised yourself that you would work on that new painting, or finish that next chapter in your novel, but now you’re too exhausted to even think about doing anything productive. Before you know it, you find yourself lying on the couch with a big bag of chips and the television remote in your hand.

      What’s wrong with us?!

      Why is it that some people can jump out of bed first thing in the morning and some of us can’t? How exactly does anyone have the time and energy to work on their creative projects after coming home from a full day of work and putting their kids to bed?

      Is it because they have more time or energy than the rest of us? Or is it the fact they were simply born with more self-discipline and motivation?

      Maybe they stumbled upon some secret organizational system that not only gives them the opportunity, but also the energy to create their art. Or maybe this is all just a bunch of crap that we tell ourselves to make us feel better.

      Why can’t we do the stuff we want to do?

      How can we say that we want to do something day after day and still not do it? Is it because it’s too difficult, it takes too much time, or is it simply the fact that most of us have the willpower and self-discipline of a fruit fly?

      After all, we are always forcing ourselves to do stuff that we don’t want to do, whether it’s doing ab crunches, flossing our teeth, or eating Brussels sprouts. So why can’t we get ourselves to do the things that we say we want to do?

      Is it because we don’t have enough time, energy, or motivation? Or is it something else? Why would getting ourselves to do something we want to do, be any more difficult than doing all of the crap we don’t want to do?

      So how do we follow through? How do we find the time and energy to do the things that are most important to us?

      Maybe the first step would be to admit that what we’re currently doing doesn’t seem to be working.

      PASSION IS A TRAP

      Inspiration is for amateurs, the rest of us just show up and get to work. ~Chuck Close

      We’ve all heard the sayings…

      Love what you do.

      Follow your passion.

      Enthusiasm is the fuel that drives your dreams.

      However if there is one thing I’ve learned about creativity and getting stuff done, it’s the fact that it doesn’t really matter how you feel—it’s what you do.

      Despite what you may have heard, passion has never painted a picture or written a single word. Feelings come and go, which is why we can’t rely on them to fuel our creative goals.

      Creativity is not always exciting

      When we first start creating our art, we are filled with all of this excitement and enthusiasm. We can’t wait to start painting, writing, or taking pictures of everything we see. This is our creative honeymoon period where everything is awesome and each day is a brand new adventure.

      Then one day it suddenly becomes work.

      A deadline comes up, and a commission falls through, or a rejection letter shows up in the mail. Suddenly it starts to feel a lot more like work, and it’s not as much fun anymore. Our initial enthusiasm begins to fade, and we start looking for our next grand life adventure.

      Passion vs. Consistency

      Let’s face it. Nobody becomes a writer because they love the process of writing—they may love the idea of writing. But the actual process or writing is often frustrating, boring, and a hell of a lot of work.

      Sure we want to become writers because we like writing (or, at least, the idea of writing) and we become artists because we like painting and creating beautiful things. Like any other job, however, there will always be good days and not-so-good days along the way.

      There’s a reason that the tortoise wins the race. In the long run, consistency will beat passion and excitement every single time.

      Passion burns itself out, and excitement eventually fades away, but consistency is all about putting our head down and doing the work whether we feel like it or not.

      Even though we may not be able to control how our audience will respond to our creative work, the one thing we can always control is the amount of work we are willing to do.

      Passion and motivation are unreliable

      Don’t get me wrong. There’s nothing inherently wrong with being excited about your project or getting yourself psyched up to achieve your dreams. Having enthusiasm for your project is great, but unfortunately, it is also extremely unreliable.

      Enthusiasm comes and goes because it’s based on things like our mood, the people around us, and how we might be feeling that day. This is the reason so many New Year’s Resolutions fail. We expect our enthusiasm to last and be enough to carry us through the tough times—but it never does.

      We can’t create motivation on demand

      Because our motivation is based on our constantly changing emotions, we can’t really create enthusiasm in ourselves any more than we can demand love from someone else.

      As ironic as it seems, it’s very difficult to change the way you feel simply by wanting to change the way you feel. In other words, we can’t simply overpower our emotions with reason and logic because it just doesn’t work that way. Our feelings can change without warning, which is why our enthusiasm often abandons us when we may need it the most.

      Motivation is kind of like that unreliable friend who is fun to have around, but always seems to disappear when you need something from him. This is why we can’t count on being motivated when it’s time to sit down and do our creative

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