Once there was a woman who wanted to help people with a product she had in mind, so she started a company.
She read about similar products, and began creating hers. She tested and tweaked it until it was just right. She let people use it to be sure it served them well. She used their feedback to tweak the product even more. She created a strategy to launch the product into the marketplace, and off it went to great success. The woman was happy.
For a long time the product performed well for its customers. The woman created a machine to manufacture it, and month after month the product went out and revenue came in.
Demand was so heavy, in fact, that the woman had trouble keeping the machine going. It needed constant maintenance, and sometimes it broke! The woman no longer had time to test her product, to read about similar products, or to strategize about the best ways to send it into the marketplace.
Then one day nobody wanted her product anymore. Another product came on the market that was superior, and so the woman had to close her company.
Woe to the person who focuses so much on maintaining the machine that she forgets about research, innovation, and strategy.
Neglecting the Rhythms of Creativity
We all have a limited amount of time and energy. Sometimes we get so caught up with “maintaining the machine” that we neglect the whole process of creativity.
We neglect reading up on trends, trying to make the machine better, talking with others about it, developing new strategies, and so on. Don’t neglect the things that made you and your work useful in the first place.
How to Get Our Brilliance Back
I was talking about all this with an entrepreneur friend the other day. He launched an IT company fifteen years ago and is in the process of selling it for more than $50 million.
“I tend to think the way to make room for things like research, innovation, and strategy,” I told him, “is to work smarter. Outsource, for example.”
“You have to decide it’s important,” he said. “If you make it a priority, you’ll figure the rest out.”
He’s right. I could offer all kinds of productivity hacks, and there’s a place for these. But none of it matters if we haven’t already decided that the rhythms of creativity are important.
How Does This Look in Your World?
In the above I’ve referred to the work of companies, but the same principles apply to the work of a writer or creative or designer or manager. We can get so busy with the day to day that we neglect the rhythms and practices that help us produce our best work.
Whether you work with words or images, ideas or people, there’s always a machine to maintain. And if we focus on the machine at the expense of creativity, we end up irrelevant and unhappy.
On the other hand, if we keep the machine in its place and clear the table so we can create, we’ll be more useful to those around us, and we’ll have more fun along the way.
Question: What’s the machine that you need to keep in its place? You can leave a comment by clicking here.
Hi Chad! Great post. This is something I’m slowly learning as I write my book. Not all time is created equal when it comes to getting my chapters done. I’ve found I simply can’t write efficiently and creatively at night – I’m just too tired! While that’s the easiest time for me to carve out (the kids are in bed), I have to find daytime or else it will take me twice as long to write. There’s certainly a machine of 40 chapters to get done, but the creative space for those chapters has to come at some specific times. What I CAN do well at night is read, so I save my research reading for then and the writing for the day.
Wishing you a wonderful 2015! Thanks for all your great blog posts.
Natasha
Natasha, so good to hear from you. I love how you’re thinking about your optimal times for various kinds of activity and then going with the grain of that. Really smart. Do you take notes as you read? If not, try taking 5 to 10 minutes after you read something to ask “OK, what were the main points i got out of that?” Write them down, and then review your notes regularly. Todd Henry suggests every morning, but that’s impossible for me. ANyway, this rhythm of noting learnings and revisiting them has been really helpful to me.
Happy New Year to you too! Thanks for engaging with my work. I’m grateful.
That’s a great idea – thanks for the suggestion! I read almost everything in my Kindle app on my iPad, so I’m able to highlight, but it’s not the same as summarizing key learnings as you’re suggesting. I’m going to give it a try! Thanks!
It would be the space around me , and the employees who walk through my door…. The constant draining of my energy solving this or that…. I know its my job, but in the process of doing everything else, I loose my creative thinking time…. I know this sounds silly….
Floyd, that doesn’t sound silly at all. I think a lot of professionals can relate to that feeling. Would it be possible to establish specific times during the week when you’re available for questions/guidance and block off the rest so you have more time for creativity? This may require an adjustment on everybody’s part, it might even be painful, but a move in this direction could yield big dividends for everyone concerned, including your employees.
The tools keep changing, and that’s just to keep up with the blogging world. There’s article writing, ezine articles, book compilations… I would love to be able to just do ONE thing well!
I hear you, Sally! Tools can be great, but they can also be a distraction.
It’s really all about balance, isn’t it? Even machines need down time for maintenance. I’ve found the key in taking a Sabbath rest each week to focus on something other than myself and my plans and goals and aspirations. In doing so, I find that it’s so much easier to approach problems and work with a renewed sense of purpose and creativity.
Anita, rest is vital to creative enterprise, yes! And so is the process of developing new skill sets, setting strategy, engaging the right stimuli, and so on…
I fall into this so easily. Sometimes I need to give myself permission to be still, listen, or just read. My best ideas often come in these moments where it ‘seems’ like I’m not accomplishing anything concrete.
So true.
You make good sense, Chad. I’m watching this happen where I work. One of the roadblocks I see is how to keep the current machine maintained to keep the business going (sustaining jobs, services, etc.) while my boss develops the new machine? Training others to be competent enough to carry on the current work is a challenge. Moving forward is imperative, though, as we see the current ‘machine’ becoming obsolete. Your post gives me empathy for my boss. I need to remember to be part of her plan for progress, and not grumble about all the changes, as those in the position of maintaining so often do.
At the same time, I need to be looking at my own, personal, move forward. Being an employee becomes more and more a sideline as writing takes centre stage. One must be maintained appropriately (I do want to keep eating), while the second is developed. I’m going to have to re-read your post now, with that in mind!
Excellent! Loved your comment about eating! Maintenance does have its place…
My machine is finding the newest and greatest articles and “hacks” from several people that will help me produce greatness. What ultimately happens is I spend so much time trying to do things perfectly that I end up with many started, but few completed projects. I am in the middle of 3 writing projects right now.
I think it is due to a level of fear too that keeps me from finishing things I am working on.
Keen insights, Chris, and they’re helpful to me too. Thank you!