“I’m not doing my creative work. I guess don’t take myself seriously enough. Maybe I just don’t have what it takes.”
THE TRUTH:
You’re fine, and you can change the story you tell yourself NOW.
Do your creative work today, do it tomorrow, and then tell yourself, “I am writing regularly now.” (I say writing here, but this is true for any creative work that comes from the soul.)
And you commit to yourself to keep up the streak. You make that as important as anything.
Here’s the thing: you don’t have to spend hours a day. Begin with minutes.
(I really do mean minutes. I’ve gone as low as 6 minutes. And anyone can find 6 or 10 or 15 minutes in their day.) (And yes, after you build your muscles, you can increase the time.)
You have the idea that you need two or three hours to “get into the right headspace.” And it’s true that there’s a spacious, free-flowing creativity that comes from having long stretches of time to devote to your work. I’ve gone to artist’s colonies, and I love that full creative immersion so much.
But minutes every day will get you further than one long stretch once every month or even every couple weeks.
Why? You’ve been there–you know. You look forward to that time, and then by the time you get there, the anxiety has started to build.
There’s a lot of pressure on this time. Your body feels antsy. You have the desire to eat, to clear your desk, to check your email. You do one of those things and you get pulled away. When you come back, there’s guilt–twenty minutes or half an hour lost. Maybe you succumb to more procrastination.
If you get to your work, it feels strange, foreign, like a dried tree branch not at all related to the living idea that first pulsed inside you. You have to reacquaint yourself with it. Who are these people again? What were you thinking last time??
Touching your work every day keeps it alive, keeps it connected to your beating heart and creative vision.
Make that time. You are worth it. You can do it.
