Creative Is Our Job Now
Over this summer I’ve been trying to build up some content for my website and let people know I’m open for business. I say I’ve been trying. I’m sure you well know that you can have good intentions to get things done and you get a good start, but then you poke your head out of your creative cubby hole and notice that there’s housework that needs to be done, and there are errands to run, and then someone needs you to do something else, and so on. So you do all of that and get back to the cubby hole only to find it’s 9 pm, and you wonder how in the hell did all that time get sucked away from you? So you wind down and try to get a good night’s sleep so you can get a good start tomorrow, and you know what happens. Rinse, Lather, Repeat.
If you’re a creative that wants to go pro, the outside world trying to barge in is a real problem because your family members and friends may not realize that this is your job now, and it’s also possible that you may not realize this is your job now. It’s also possible you might feel guilty doing your creative things when you look around and see there’s so much to be done. I can tell you that I’ve dealt with all three of these issues, and in this time of isolation because of the pandemic when every day seems almost identical in a way, I find myself wondering if there’s a point to it. It’s easy to get discouraged. It’s tempting to quit. We mustn’t quit.
If we want to be professional creatives, we have to show up. We have to do the work if we want the reward, and we need to gently but firmly tell the outside world to step off while we work. I would bet good money that the people in your life would get very upset if you came to their job and interrupted what they were doing, yet that is exactly what they are doing to you. If you’re like me, you hate saying no, but the simple fact is we need to say it more often. It’s the only way our to-do list will be a priority over someone else’s.
The other person who needs to hear that being a creative is your job is you. In the book “The War of Art”, Stephen Pressfield talks about The Resistance, which is the excuses your brain gives you as to why you shouldn’t be doing the work. We’ve all heard them. The voice tells you that you’re not good enough, that someone else is doing it, that you should be something else with your time, that you’re missing the game, and so on. The Resistance wants you to give up, and we just can’t let it win. Who’s the judge of who is good enough? Not the Resistance. Who cares if someone else is doing it? This creative work is the best use of my time; it’s time someone else learns to do the laundry. I can DVR the game. It’s not that important anyway.
This is our job now. We need to schedule it as such. Block out time every day to do your job. Right now, I’m working from 9 am to 12 on writing, I take a lunch break, and I work from 1–5 on the project I’m shipping. I don’t answer the phone, I try to avoid picking it up to scroll through Twitter or Instagram but I have to tell you, sometimes I fail at that. I wear noise-canceling headphones because I don’t want to get distracted, and I have some instrumental music on. I found some albums by Tycho a few years back, and I think they’re just about perfect for my work time.
I have made two rules about working in the studio: I only work in the studio, and I only work in the studio if I know what I’m going to be doing. Especially right now, it’s very important to separate work and life. I have not been very good at this in the past because the studio is where my Mac is. I bought some new living room furniture over the summer, and it would be a shame not to use it. At the end of the day, I leave the office, and I don’t go back in. Regarding the second rule, in the last part of my night I write down what I did today and where I left off. Then I write down what the next steps are on anything I’m working on. Sometimes, I’ve made a checklist for big projects, and I check off what I’ve done. I check my calendar for anything I have to do the next day, and then on the next page, I write down tomorrow’s plan. That plan is my ticket into the office the next day, and yes, I do think of the door as a checkpoint.
Other self-described ‘gurus’ say there should be some accountability built into your process. I agree to the extent that there ought to be some factor like a deadline to indicate some kind of measurement, but other than that I say we are grown-ass people who know what we should be doing. I’m not really a big fan of life coaches, mentorships, or accountability partners, so I don’t use them. If you feel you need a person in your process to hold you accountable or give you direction, go for it. My accountability is my ticket into the office, I have a deadline for the content I’m creating, and my reward for getting the job done is I go play on Instagram and Twitter for a block of time.
So, to recap, we’re creatives now. This is our job. We must tell everyone, including ourselves, that we have work to do. We need to schedule that time and not break it. We need to have a plan for the day. We need to separate work and life. We need to recognize we’re adults who have a job to do, and we need to do it.