Start by finding out what you feel passionate about.
People say it’s a ‘passion project’ when they’re describing a film they had to create, a book they felt driven to write or an album they needed to record...
...even though they’d no idea if their work would sell.
If you can find what you feel passionate about, you’ll have a reason for getting up, getting out there and for practising your most important work.
You’ll be able to turn your passion into a habit like:
- Writing every day on Steemit until you have an outline for a book
- Testing new business ideas with your ideal customers
- Running 30–40 miles a week
- Mastering dead-lifts in the gym
- Meditating for twenty minutes before breakfast
- Expressing gratitude once per day to a friend or family member
Tip: Have a look at the trending tags on Steemit and ask yourself which one of these fires you up?)
Now, please don’t get me wrong:
Some people will wonder what you’re doing and how you’re spending your time.
It doesn’t help that many of your early ideas serve as inward markers of your progress – that you turned up, that you tried – rather than something you can show to the world.
Passion will keep you going when nothing else will. It’s your lifeline during dark times.
So pay attention to what drives and inspires you, to what you work on in the wee small hours (that's a Frank Sinatra reference).
It’s your guiding purpose.
Lasting Change is One Smart Habit Away
Understand becoming more creative is as much about preparation and smart habits as it is about moments of divine inspiration.
Matthew Weiner spent years researching Mad Men on the side.
Napoleon Hill lay in bed each night mentally preparing with his imaginary council for the following day.
Even the American novelist John Cheever turned to his journal when he felt creatively blocked.
You’ll have more time to prepare and create smart habits if you cull pointless activities from your life.
Instead of watching another boxset on Netflix, focus on easing yourself into your work and on nudging yourself forwards, one idea, one side-project at a time.
When you’re starting out, you may need to support yourself with a ’real job’ and practice your passion projects around the margins of the day, in the morning before work or late at night.
That’s OK.
Your job is a safety net that gives you freedom to learn what your audience wants and your craft demands each day.
It gives you the freedom to jump without feeling overwhelmed by fear. Besides, lots of artists worked in real jobs when they were starting out.
T.S. Elliot worked in a bank.
Ernest Hemingway was a journalist.
Even Leonardo da Vinci took jobs as an advisor to his patrons and his king.
If it helps, know that side-projects (whether you consider them your job or what you do late at night or first thing in the morning) can lead to great and unexpected things.
I know it’s tough.
They’re days when you strike the page or canvas repeatedly, and nothing sparks.
Your creative work is a grind, you put in hours alone in a room and produce nothing more than a useless sentence, a single cord or a sketch.
Your practice feels like a lonely cry in the dark.
And the reply?
A little voice whispering,
‘What do you think you’re doing?’
Stephen King heard that same voice when he wrote an early draft of Carrie, but his wife helped him finish his first book. He was brave enough to listen to his mentor.
Remember, you are not a failure.
Turn up every day, practice your craft and find out what it and your audience demands.
Acknowledge your fears and self-doubt for what they are: imposters in the way of your creative ideas.
Push past them!
If you need help practising, or you want to save time, pick a creative master to follow.
Using their guidance, you can avoid many of the potholes and wrong turns that lie before you.
Remember to be bold with your creative experiments, to challenge your assumptions, to put one foot in front the other and to keep going. The road ahead is long and winding, but you are stronger and more powerful than you can imagine.