Reading time: About 3 minutes

Do you think your writing would improve if only you could become more creative? Here are seven ways to boost your creativity….

We’ve never had pets in our household. Although I’d dearly love a cat, my husband is highly allergic to animal dander — and the thought of a hairless cat (pictured adjacent) strikes me as creepy rather than comforting.

Truth told, however, our children felt the pet absence more profoundly. When they were still young enough to want to go hiking with us, they’d pick up slugs, carry them and name them. Mom and dad couldn’t supply a pet, so they’d find one of their own.

I always thought this illustrated one of the best things about kids — their deep wells of creativity.

Whenever someone tells me they’re not “creative” enough to write, I want to beg them to remember their childhood. We are all born creative. Some of us just lose it faster than others.

Here are seven tips to rediscover your own creativity.

1-Become an expert. I know, I know, an expert sounds like the polar opposite of a creative person. You’ve been picturing Beethoven, and I give you an engineer. But think about it: Someone who is creative joins things they already know into new and unexpected arrangements. By having a rich understanding of a particular subject, you’re in a better position to think of creative ideas. Make sure you really know what you’re writing about.

2-Brainstorm. For writers, one of the best possible ways to be more creative is by mindmapping, or as I like to call it, “brainstorming with yourself.” Mindmapping is fast, visual and fun. It’s the closest thing to a cure-all for writers I’ve ever found.

3-Don’t just sit at your desk. Sitting and staring at the computer screen until beads of blood form on your forehead is no way to create. Go! For a walk. For a run. Even out for a coffee. Sitting is toxic to creative thought. Get moving. Now!

4-Ask questions. Have you ever noticed how smart people are never afraid to ask “stupid” questions? In fact, there is no such thing as a stupid question. There are only people too stupid (too afraid, really) to ask it. When you’re interviewing someone, the stupider the question, the better. I frequently ask subjects to talk to me like I’m a 10-year-old. That often makes them smile, and it encourages them to get rid of the jargon and tell me stories.

5-Try different perspectives. Maltese writer Edward de Bono argued the human brain thinks in several distinct ways — not all of which are natural to every person. In his marvelous book Six Thinking Hats he presents six systematic ways in which you can challenge your brain.

1. Red hat (emotional): What do your feelings tell you?
2. White hat (objective): What are the facts?
3. Yellow hat (positive): What do you know will work?
4. Black hat (negative): What do you know won’t work?
5. Green hat (creative): What are some alternative ideas?
6. Blue hat (broad perspective): What’s the best overall solution?

6-Challenge any negativity. We like to think that working better will make us happy. But, instead, the opposite is true: when we’re happy we work better. If you want to be more creative, try to make yourself happier first. You might do this by listening to some music, reading a good book or meditating. Do whatever it takes to reduce or eliminate negative thoughts or self-criticisms.

7-If at first you don’t succeed, take a break… Getting access to your creativity takes effort, but it needn’t feel like the grim repetition of banging your head against a brick wall. If you keep running into roadblocks, then stop driving and try again when the roads are clear.

Creativity cannot be “ordered” to perform. It appears on its own terms when it has a welcoming audience. As long as you keep inviting it, creativity will eventually return.

If you liked this post, you’ll also like Is stress killing your creativity?

An earlier version of this post first appeared on my blog on Jan. 29/13.

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Need some help developing a better, more sustainable writing or editing routine? Learn about my three-month accountability program called Get It Done. There is turn-over each month, and priority will go to those who have applied first. You can go directly to the application form and you’ll hear back from me within 24 hours. 

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My video podcast last week addressed how to deal with perfectionism. You can watch the video or read the transcript, and you can also subscribe to my YouTube channel.

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How do you boost your creativity? We can all learn from each other, so please, share your thoughts with my readers and me in the comments section, below. If you comment on today’s post (or any others) by April 30/25, I’ll put you in a draw for a digital copy of my first book, 8 1/2 Steps to Writing Faster, Better. To enter, please scroll down to the comments, directly underneath the related posts links, below. You don’t have to join Disqus to post! Read my tutorial to learn how to post as a guest. (It’s easy!)

Reading time: About 3 minutes

Do you know how to let your mind wander? Don’t worry if people call you a “daydreamer.” A wandering mind is your passport to greater creativity.

A majestic cypress tree grew outside my grade 11 classroom window, eons ago.

I remember spending hours staring at it, exploring its velvety green branches and reflecting on the boredom of my classes and wondering what I might do with my life when I was finally and blessedly allowed to escape school.

What can you do when you’re bored?

Fortunately, perhaps because I always earned good grades (well, except in math!), my teachers failed to notice my inattention, and they never criticized me for daydreaming.

Also, fortunately, this was several decades before cell phones and I didn’t have an easier way of distracting myself with something most of us see as “entertaining.”

These days, when I’m bored, I go to the online New York Times and read an article on my phone.

I might do this while I’m waiting for a meeting to start, standing in a bank lineup (although I try to avoid that avoidable form of torture with online banking) or killing time before a doctor/dentist appointment.

The benefits of a wandering mind

Now, however, I’m thinking I’d be better off just allowing my mind to wander. I concluded this after reading some research from scientists from the Max Planck Institute for Human Cognitive and Brain Sciences in Leipzig, Germany, and the University of York in England.

Over the last several generations, our society has viewed mind wandering as a failure in control. Now, however, neuroscientists can tell us it’s actually an advantage. “We found that in people who often purposefully allow their minds to go off on a tangent, the cortex is thicker in some prefrontal regions,” says Johannes Golchert, from Leipzig, and first author of the study. (Increased cortical thickness is associated with greater intelligence.)

The study also found that when people intentionally allow their minds to wander, two main brain networks — the default-mode network and the frontoparietal network — work more closely together.

This combined effort helps writers because the first network, which focuses on information from memory and the second one, which inhibits irrelevant stimuli, are both more effective when they work together.

Don’t try too hard!

But the big secret to mind wandering is not to try too hard. Researcher Michael Corballis, who is author of the book The Wandering Mind: What the Brain Does When You’re Not Looking, suggests doing “semi-boring” things like driving or knitting, which engage our brains just the right amount yet still allow us to escape from the present. Others suggest three Bs for creativity: bath, bed and bus. Although Corballis likes to add two more: boardroom and boredom.

For Damon Young, Honorary Fellow in Philosophy at the University of Melbourne, another B helps with mind wandering: body movement. In his book, How to Think About Exercise, he describes how walking or running can increase our creativity.

“It’s like you’re removing the symphony conductor from your mind, and suddenly it starts playing improvisational jazz,” he says. “When that happens, your mind starts throwing up interesting ideas, impressions, feelings, epiphanies and revelations that you otherwise would not have had.”

Young attributes the difference to something about the movement itself. “[It’s] partly because the body is devoting its energy to motor functions of moving and partly because you’re taking resources away from the part that co-ordinates ideas,” he says. “It’s a kind of mental ‘unsorting’ that takes away categories and relationships of ideas and jiggles them about into new combinations.”

Specific advice for how to let your mind wander

I like to use mind wandering as part of my writing practice in two ways:

1-I begin by planning some thinking time away from my desk. I like to walk and think about what I’m going to write. But I do this thinking in an easy, ultra-relaxed way. My mind wanders and I let it go in whatever direction it wants, merely observing. This is part of the reason it’s so important for me to get away from my desk. I don’t want to sit there feeling critical of myself for not being ‘more productive.’ It’s as if the act of walking gives me permission to take a slower, more circuitous — although, ultimately, more productive — route.

2-Then, I do a mindmap. This mindmap — which is freer, more easy-going and far more inspiring than an outline — allows me to think on the page. I try to write quickly, allowing my default network to remain in more control so that my linear, logical and non-creative brain can take a back seat. See my video about mindmapping for more advice.

In the future, I’m also going to think about leaving my phone shut off when I have a few minutes to wait for something. I’m going to stop resenting the act of having to wait and, instead, see it as a chance to relax, think of new things and just let my mind wander wherever it wants to go.

With luck, my mind will take me somewhere interesting.

An earlier version of this post first appeared on my blog on May 23/17.

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My video podcast last week described why you should stop indulging in writerly guilt. Go here  to see the video or read the transcript, and you can also subscribe to my YouTube channel.

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Need some help developing a better writing routine? Learn more about my Get It Done program. There is turn-over each month, and priority will go to those who have applied first. You can go directly to the application form and you’ll hear back from me within 24 hours.

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Do you encourage your mind to wander? We can all learn from each other so, please, share your thoughts with my readers and me in the “comments” section, below. Anyone who comments on today’s post (or any others) by March 31/23 will be put in a draw for a digital copy of my first book, 8 1/2 Steps to Writing Faster, Better. To leave your own comment, please, scroll down to the section, directly underneath the “related posts” links, below. Note that you don’t have to join the commenting software to post. See here to learn how to post as a guest. It’s easy!

Reading time: Less than 1 minute

This is my weekly installment of “writing about writing,” in which I scan the world to find websites, books and articles to help other writers. Today I discuss a creativity book by Joel Friedlander….

I always had a great deal of respect for Joel Friedlander, a blogger, book designer, publisher and owner of the Book Designer website, who died of cancer May 7/21. His site still offers a treasure-trove of material for self-publishers.

In 2018, he published a book on creativity titled Meeting the Muse. The book is about the motives that cause us to be creative.

Here’s a brief excerpt from the book, from chapter relating to our unique abilities:

We take in a huge amount that never gets into our conscious mind. Unrealized perceptions, intuitive connections, unspoken insights—these all become part of an unknown country, our own unconscious—the “dark side of the moon.”

This is our curse—and our salvation, because in that underground world creativity runs strong, clear, and constant, even if it’s largely unknown. It is ready to come to the surface to be a source of inspiration for your work, for yourself, for your mission here on Earth, if you’re open to it.

Treasure the uniqueness of now: it will never come again. Even if you try to recapture it, the light will be different, what you ate last night will be different, the scene will have changed, and, above all, you will be different because you have no choice but to keep changing.

If you feel your muse is failing to show up, consult this creativity book for some extra inspiration.

An earlier version of this post first appeared on my blog on Sept. 24/18.

Reading time: About 3 minutes

If you’ve ever chafed against limits — time, money, raw materials or client demands — read today’s post to learn how to be more creative despite constraints…

One of my clients emailed me this week with an important question about habits. 

“I often try to balance between routine and getting out of the routine,” he wrote. “What’s the best way to manage that?”

I know, I know, routines seem dull and predictable. There’s not much about them that sounds terribly attractive, is there? But instead of delineating the problems with routines, I encourage all writers to welcome them. Why? Because these constraints give all of us such a solid basis for creativity and innovation.

It’s a kind of a paradox, really. Something dull and predictable makes us more creative? But think about all the areas in our lives in which we embrace constraints:

Baking: we don’t try to bake a cake without some sort of leavening agent and usually a little bit of flour (even if it’s a gluten-free one like almond flour.) Yet we can all see the thousands of baked goods (hundreds of thousands?) master chefs have produced within the bounds of strict rules relating to food chemistry.

Music: in the Western world, we’ve adapted a 12-tone scale. And within this demanding limitation think of the huge range of different music that artists have created: from Louis Armstrong to Dolly Parton and from Taylor Swift to Aaron Copeland.

Construction and building design: We don’t want buildings to fall on our heads so architects and engineers carefully follow especially severe constraints, yet see the wide variety of buildings they produce: the Fontainebleau Hotel in Miami Beach, Florida, the Arc de Triomphe in Paris, the Doge’s Palace in Venice, St. Paul’s Cathedral in London.

Finally, let’s look at writing and reading: If we’re writing a book, we know it needs to be divided into chapters. And if we want it to be published by a traditional publisher, we know it must be an average length of 80,000 words (although sci fi and fantasy can be a bit longer.) 

If we’re academics, writing articles for peer-reviewed publications, we know we’re going to need an abstract and our word count goal is in the range of 8,000 words. If we’re readers (in English) we know we need to read from left to right.

Rules. Rules everywhere. We don’t even think about many of them. They’ve become so obvious that they’re unspoken and unnoticed. But they exist.

Businesses are also exceptionally familiar with rules and this is an area that’s produced some interesting research. A recent article in the Harvard Business Review, by Oguz Acar, Murat Tarakci and Daan van Knippenberg suggests that managers can innovate better by embracing constraints. 

According to the study, “When there are no constraints on the creative process, complacency sets in, and people follow what psychologists call the path-of-least-resistance – they go for the most intuitive idea that comes to mind rather than investing in the development of better ideas. 

“Constraints, in contrast, provide focus and a creative challenge that motivates people to search for and connect information from different sources to generate novel ideas for new products, services, or business processes.”

The same mechanism applies to writing. While you might think you’d be more creative with a do-whatever-you-want-whenever-you-want kind of attitude, in fact, having a small but pre-determined time for writing each day is going to help you in three important ways:

1-Routines will make you more productive: When you’ve decided what you’re going to accomplish when, you’re already halfway towards your goal. Your mind and body will stretch to achieve it. Being productive is the opposite of doing everything at once. Instead, it requires you to become highly focused and this focus will allow you to avoid pointless activities otherwise known as “busy” work. 

2-Routines allow you to be more creative: Once you know your limits you’ll be able to push against those boundaries, seeking to find creative ways of accomplishing your tasks.  Shakespeare wrote 154 sonnets. In each one of them he followed exactly the same structure and yet each one is a little gem. Structures needn’t limit you. Instead, they give you room to move within them.

3-A lack of routine is likely to lead to overwork: If you don’t give yourself limits, you’re likely to work all the time. Writers who work from home — as so many of us do, during the pandemic — are at particular danger of being stuck in this horrible habit. Routines don’t only constrain you. They also protect you.

If you’re convinced about the value of routine, but just can’t seem to stick with your commitment to yourself, this likely means one very simple problem: you’ve made your goal too big. Whatever time commitment you’re trying to achieve, cut it in half. I’ve used this trick myself and it absolutely works. 

And here’s a final — and equally important guideline: From time to time, feel free to break your routine. I think that was perhaps what my client had been getting at – the unbearable burden of carrying the same routine all the time. Sometimes, it just feels too much. We all benefit from switching things up every once in a while. But break your routine deliberately, irregularly — less than five percent of the time— and with absolutely no guilt. (Guilt spoils everything.)

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Need some help developing a sustainable writing routine? Learn more about my Get It Done program. The group is now full but there is turn-over each month, and priority will go to those who have applied first. You can go directly to the application form and you’ll hear back from me within 24 hours. 

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My video podcast last week addressed the question, how much is too much editing? Or, see the transcript, and consider subscribing to my YouTube channel. If you have a question about writing you’d like me to address, be sure to send it to me by email, Twitter or Skype and I’ll try to answer it in the podcast.

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Do you find that constraints help you learn how to be more creative? We can all learn from each other so, please, share your thoughts with my readers and me in the “comments” section below.  Anyone who comments on today’s post (or any others) by Jan. 31/22 will be put in a draw for a digital copy of my first book, 8 1/2 Steps to Writing Faster, Better. Please, scroll down to the comments, directly underneath the “related posts” links, below. Note that you don’t have to join Disqus to post. See here to learn how to post as a guest. It’s easy!

Reading time: About 4 minutes

Did you learn about mindmapping in high school? Your teacher may not have told you that mindmapping for writing is one of the best ways to use the tool…

When people use terms like “writer’s block” or “resistance” or “procrastination,” I have a ready answer for them. “Try mindmapping for writing,” I advise.

The technique is not only fun but also easy to use. And if anyone tells me mindmapping doesn’t work for writing, I suspect that they’re probably doing something wrong. In fact, I have a standing invitation to members of my Get It Done accountability group to scan and email me their mindmaps that aren’t working. Generally, I can diagnose the reason in a couple of minutes. 

Here are the most common problems I find:

1. They use mindmapping software. While a number of software corporations have made a great deal of money producing mindmapping software, I don’t suggest you use it. Evidence shows that the relaxed, devil-may-care attitude you need for mindmapping is at odds with the demands of sitting in front of a keyboard. (For more information, check out a  marvellous and brief — it’s just 10 minutes long — Clive Thompson video.) You want to engage your creative brain when you’re mindmapping and a paper and pen will feel more relaxing to you. The only time to use mindmapping software is so you can copy a mindmap you’ve created by hand and save it for later use. 
2. They use paper that’s too small. You don’t want to feel cramped or constrained while you’re mindmapping.  For this reason, 11 x 17 paper is generally the best size to use. It’s large enough to give you lots of room to express your thoughts but not so large as to be daunting. If you’re doing a really big project however, (say, planning a book or a dissertation), unprinted upon newsprint, available at many craft stores, or packing paper may be a better choice.
3. They don’t ask a question. Many mindmapping instructors tell people to write their topic in the centre of the page. I don’t. Instead, I always recommend starting with a question. Why? Topics are often boring. Questions, on the other hand, are provocative. If you hear a question — even if it’s one you’ve asked yourself — your brain is hard-wired to want to answer it. As well, questions tend to be more focused than topics, meaning that you’ll be finding a more interesting and specific way into your story. 
4. They don’t start in the centre of the page. I see many mindmaps where the topic/question appears off to the left or the right or wandering down toward the bottom of the page. Don’t do this! You’re putting the question on the page first, right? So, it should be easy to ensure it ends up more or less in the middle. This will leave you maximum room to put your answers all around the page, in any spot that strikes your fancy. It’s important for you to have this sense of freedom and space when you’re mindmapping. 
5. They answer questions with more questions. If you have more than one question, save it for another mindmap. Your original question calls for an answer. (If my husband asks me a question and I answer with another question‚ or vice versa, one of us usually says, “Are we really playing a game of questions only?”) 
6. They don’t put everything in a bubble. When you mindmap, be sure to draw a circle around every ‘answer.’ This is like putting icing on a cake, a garnish on a plate, or an ornament on your mantlepiece. It’s prettier and neater and it’s a sign that you have finished that answer and you’re ready to move onto the next one. 
7. They provide too much detail. Your mindmap should not be a series of mini-essays. Your answers or bubbles should be no more than (roughly) four or five words and fewer than that is A-OK. I often say that mindmaps should be like labels on coat hooks in a kindergarten classroom. Short and sweet. They are memory jogs for you and are not meant to be anything more than that. Don’t tire yourself out writing your mindmap. Save some of your energy for the actual writing.
8. They don’t mindmap more than once. There is no rule saying that one mindmap = one piece of writing. If you finish your mindmap and fail to have what I describe as an “aha!” experience — or the inspiration you need to start writing — then you should immediately do another mindmap. Use whatever ideas you generated from your first mindmap to come up with a new question for a second one. And if that one doesn’t inspire, do a third (and fourth, fifth or sixth) if necessary. Mindmaps are fast. You should be able to do each one in three to five minutes. 
9. They don’t get creative enough with it. Mindmaps can and should include all sorts of stuff that’s more interesting than mere facts. Try to include stories and metaphors as well. (Ask yourself: How can I answer my question with a story/example/anecdote? How can I answer it with a metaphor?) And try some creative ways to prepare your mindmaps as well. For some people, putting the “bubbles” on individual sticky notes is a great way to mindmap. You can spread them out over a wall that way and then move them around easily. (I suggest you take photographs of any arrangements you particularly like.)
10. They don’t ask themselves meta questions. One of the best ways to use mindmapping is to ask yourself questions about YOUR writing process. For example, you might do mindmaps on any of the following questions: Why am I having so much difficulty fleshing out this particular character? Why am I procrastinating so much? How could I organize my book/dissertation in a more useful way?
11. They don’t doodle. Doodling is not an enemy of attention or a waste of time. Instead, it’s a valuable habit that allows you to increase your focus and expand your creativity. Doodling is particularly useful to you while you’re mindmapping. I’ve described why, here. 

If you’ve tried mindmapping for writing before and figured it just didn’t work for you, please try again, following the guidelines above. And if you’ve never tried it, don’t lose any more time. Give it a whirl today. It should help you defeat “writer’s block,” “resistance” and “procrastination” all in one go. 

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Looking for some help with developing a sustainable writing routine? Learn more about my Get It Done program. Deadline for the group starting Nov. 1 is this Thursday, Oct. 21st. You can go directly to the application form and you’ll hear back from me within 24 hours. 

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My video podcast last week addressed how to write a better college application essay. Or, see the transcript, and consider subscribing to my YouTube channel. If you have a question about writing you’d like me to address, be sure to send it to me by email, Twitter or Skype and I’ll try to answer it in the podcast.

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Have you ever used mindmapping? How did you find it? We can all learn from each other so, please, share your thoughts with my readers and me in the “comments” section below.  Anyone who comments on today’s post (or any others) by Oct. 31/21 will be put in a draw for a digital copy of my first book, 8 1/2 Steps to Writing Faster, Better. Please, scroll down to the comments, directly underneath the “related posts” links, below. Note that you don’t have to join Disqus to post. See here to learn how to post as a guest. It’s easy! 

Reading time: Less than 3 minutes

Do you know how important stories are to writing? Learn how to be a great storyteller…

Our dishwasher broke last week. It was an expensive model — a Bosch — and only three years old so I was plenty peeved.

Making matters worse, our triplets were celebrating their birthday and the repair guy couldn’t arrive until the Big Day, for which we had planned a celebratory dinner. 

Following COVID protocol, we planned to have our dinner outside, in the back garden. And we’d invited only three people from outside our household — my son, his fiancée, and my brother-in-law. We sat at well-distanced tables and all of us were wearing toques and long underwear because we wanted to feel like real Canadians. (Nah, the issue was it’s been a particularly chilly spring in Vancouver this year.)

But while I had — reluctantly — envisioned a party with lots of dishes all having to be washed by hand at 10 pm, I was wrong. The repair guy arrived on the birthday morning and against all odds he was able to fix the problem in less than 20 minutes.

How did he achieve this miracle  — when we’d been warned that parts might be necessary and could take weeks for them to arrive? He did it by removing a quarter-inch piece of crab shell that had become lodged in the outflow drain. I took back all my swear words about appliance repair people in general and about Bosch in particular and understood immediately that the problem had been our fault. Not the machine’s. 

I tell you this story to illustrate the value of stories and to explain how to be a great storyteller. 

Many of us make assumptions about story-telling. We think,

• it should be reserved for fiction writing
• that facts are more important and useful than stories
• stories are self-indulgent 

Or, we question our own ability to tell stories. We say,

• I can’t think of good stories about my topic
• I always ramble 
• I’m never sure about how much detail to use

But if you’ve ever watched a TED talk, you’ll have noticed that almost every speaker starts by describing some first-hand, real-life experience relating to the information in their talk. Why do they do that? 

Story-telling is king because we retain stories far longer than data, and we learn far more from them. If you’ve ever heard a really good speech or read a really good book, review it again and count how many stories it contained. Stories help create cultures for families, companies, organizations, and entire countries. People learn what to do by hearing the stories of others.

So, how do you tell a good story?

First, you want to begin with a hook — an attention-getter. In this post, my hook is a broken dishwasher. Most people have dishwashers and many have had the experience of one breaking down at the most inopportune time. But the real hook is implied: what do dishwashers have to do with writing? That’s a mystery. And mysteries keep readers engaged.

After the hook, you tell the story. Be sure to use casual, everyday words (no jargon or mumbo jumbo!) and watch your pacing. You need a clear beginning, middle and end. Of course, you’ll want to tell your story in chronological order. But be sure to seed it with interest and emotion. For example, I describe the logistics of our COVID “dinner party,” because just about everyone in the world can relate to the struggle of how to celebrate birthdays during a pandemic. That’s going to help make my story resonate. I also told a joke about Canadians because who doesn’t love to make fun of us?

Finally, after telling the story  — and this can be the tricky bit — be sure to relate it to your purpose. Why is this story relevant? What’s the moral or point? No one wants to hear a story that isn’t the least bit relevant to them. (More on this, in a moment.)

When I started writing this blog post, I knew I had to begin with a story. Immediately, I cast my mind back over the last two weeks. “What are some of the interesting things that happened to me?” I asked myself. I didn’t begin by asking, “What’s a story about writing?” Instead, I immediately gravitated towards the concept of finding something that was interesting. Having a story-finding frame of mind is useful to anyone who wants to become a great story-teller. 

When the dishwasher story popped into my head, I wondered whether I was going to be able to tie a broken dishwasher back to writing. But I knew I had a workable story when I figured my wrong assumption that there was a problem with a machine, could relate back to the kinds of inaccurate assumptions writers make about story-telling. 

In terms of length and pacing, the story itself is 241 words (roughly 30% of the total) and I edited it aggressively to make it as lively as possible.

I made a mistake with my dishwasher, but I hope you never make the mistake of failing to tell enough stories. It’s one of the best, most helpful tools you can employ to make your writing more interesting and relevant to readers. Learn how to be a great storyteller.

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Need some help developing a sustainable writing routine? Learn more about my Get It Done program. The group is now full but there is turn-over each month, and priority will go to those who have applied first. You can go directly to the application form and you’ll hear back from me within 24 hours. 

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Do you know how to be a great storyteller? We can all learn from each other so, please, share your thoughts with my readers and me in the “comments” section, below. And congratulations to Jennifer Meilink McNeeley, the winner of this month’s book prize, for a March 22/21 comment on my blog. (Please send me your email address, Jennifer!) Anyone who comments on today’s post (or any others) by April 30/21 will be put in a draw for a digital copy of my first book, 8 1/2 Steps to Writing Faster, Better. To leave your own comment, please, scroll down to the section, directly underneath the “related posts” links, below. Note that you don’t have to join the commenting software to post. See here to learn how to post as a guest. It’s easy!

Reading time: Just over 4 minutes

Do you ever despair that you’re just not creative enough? Understand that it’s not a special gift; you, too can learn to be more creative.

I am friendly, quiet, highly-organized, very determined — even stubborn. I have never seen myself as the least bit creative.

Nevertheless, I have always been drawn towards creative people. At university, I hung out with a lot of actors — finding them to be a lot more fun than the people in my interesting but little bit staid department (political science). These days, many of my friends are artists or musicians. They see the world differently than I do and I like their energy.

I’d long thought that creativity was something that you were either born with or without — a kind of a magic wand that allowed you to wave your hand and produce a rabbit out of a hat or some other novel solution. But, In fact, many psychologists believe creativity is not a special gift, reserved for a limited few. Instead, it’s a skill that anyone can learn. And, like every other skill, you get better at it with practice. 

Here are 10 ways you can improve your creativity.

1-Get enough sleep. Really! I’m not telling you this from a health point of view (although that’s important, too). Sleep is essential for creativity. While all of our sleep needs are different, the vast majority of people need somewhere between 7 and 9 hours. And yet so few of us get that. Never be ashamed of how much sleep you need. And never cut short your sleep. New research shows that sleep helps our bodies eliminate metabolic waste. Think of it as a way of restarting the hard drive that is your body. And the ONLY way to get this restoration is by sleeping. It can’t happen when we’re awake.  

2-Allow yourself to be bored. Why are so many of us terrified of being bored? These days, it’s because of our smart phones. When we’re sitting in a doctor’s office, waiting for a bus or a train, or standing in a bank lineup, our impulse is to reach for our phones. Instead, letting our minds wander is a really good thing to do. You can look at the other people in the same space as you — notice their appearance, think about what makes them tick, imagine what their lives are like. You can look at the physical space. What are the colours? What are the objects like? What makes it pretty? Or ugly? Or boring? Allowing your mind to wander in this fashion is kind of the heart of creativity. You have no obligation. Your mind can go in any direction it likes. We don’t get new ideas by doing the same old thing all the time. We have to allow our minds to wander. For more information on the research relating to boredom and creativity, check out a great article by Clive Thompson. 

3-Use sound and music. All of the artists I know work to music. None of them works in silence. Not one. Did you know it’s extremely difficult to write in silence? In fact, scientists can tell you the specific decibel level that will most help your writing. It’s 70 decibels – which is slightly louder than average conversation and about the same sound you’d experience in a busy coffee shop. I’ve long suspected that what drives so many writers to coffee shops is not the need for caffeine but the need for a certain, very specific amount of noise. If you want to use sound to improve your creativity, here are some specific tips:

• Calibrate your sound so it’s in the 70-decibel range. (That’s the sound of living-room music or a quiet vacuum cleaner.) Anything louder is going to be too distracting to you. 
• If listening to music, look for a moderate rhythm and something without too many changes in tempo. You want to look for something that’s really consistent and predictable. Some scientists believe that Baroque music is best for creativity. This includes composers like: Bach, Handel, Vivaldi, Scarlatti, Corelli, and Telemann.
• Avoid music with lyrics. While your favourite music might be death metal or Broadway show tunes, neither genre will help you write. Having to listen to other people’s words will make it far more difficult for your brain to focus on writing. 
• Pick sounds you already know: Our brains love to recognize patterns. If your brain is already familiar with the sound you’re listening to, then it will relax and allow you to focus on writing. If the sound is new, however, your brain is going to have to process it  — leaving your writing in the lurch.
• If you’re not interested in music, here are some other suggestions: The sound of rain, surf, running water, birdsong, wind. You can find all of these sounds for free on Youtube. And if you want to reproduce the sound of a coffee shop, I highly recommend a free app called coffitivity.  

4-Get exercise. Exercise not only helps your body, it also improves your creativity. In particular, aerobic exercise stimulates Brain Derived Neurotrophic Factor (BDNF), which encourages the growth of new brain cells in the hippocampus. I have chronic back pain so I can’t run but I find walking at my treadmill desk — while I write — makes me more creative and helps the words flow far more easily. See more on the link between creativity and exercise, here.   

5-Be more childlike. Young children are naturally creative not only because they’re determined to learn but also because they’re diligent about having fun. (They haven’t yet had this attitude “trained” out of them by school.) You, too, can channel this mentality to improve your creativity. Check out a terrific article on the website Inc. for some tips on how childlike thinking can make you a better leader. (Spoiler: exactly the same tips will help you become more creative, too.)

6-Take more breaks. Many of us think we’ll accomplish more if we work longer and harder. But creative people understand the true value of breaks. I’ve long cited a clever experiment by productivity expert Chris Bailey to prove this point. Chris spent a month working 90-hour weeks to see how productive that made him. His conclusion? “I got a lot done, but only during the first few days of the week; after that I didn’t have the time or mental space to recharge, so my productivity practically fell off a cliff.” When I work with writers in my Get It Done program, many of them are eager to “make up” writing time they missed during the week because they were too busy. I always tell them to take the weekend off. The rest is more valuable to them. 

7-Surround yourself with creative people. Yeah, I know. We’re in a pandemic right now and we can’t see most of our friends. The solution, I think, is to read about creative people so we can see how they do it and become inspired. Here are some suggestions: The Creative Habit by Twyla Tharp. Steal Like An Artist by Austin Kleon. Imagine: How Creativity Works by Jonah Lehrer. (Yes, I know he’s a plagiarist but hold your nose and read this book; it’s remarkable.) Just Kids by Patti Smith. Flow by Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi. The War of Art by Steven Pressfield. 

8-Understand that creativity isn’t easy. People who are creative make it look easy, in much the same way that Michelle Kwan made a triple axel look easy. But creativity can be tough and discouraging. It’s not about playing with paints in a light-filled studio on a sunny day. Instead it’s about sticking with your program when you’re discouraged with it and frustrated. In many ways, creativity is a disruptive force, resulting in all sorts of havoc. Decide how much creativity your life can handle and set up routines and practises (meditation, anyone?) that will help you handle it. 

9-Do it “just because.” The worst question for a creator is, “so, what are you going to do with that?” It suggests that — to be meaningful — everything we make needs a purpose. No, it does not! Sometimes creative work is just for the fun of it. You can create something because you feel like doing it. Don’t let concerns about function drain the creativity from your soul.

10-Give yourself enough time to be creative. For some reason we think that being creative should be fun and easy and we get surprised when it isn’t. The secret? Practise. Block off time in your schedule for creative work. Treat it like an appointment with yourself. Having a good if/then routine will also help you preserve your time commitment to creativity. 

And keep reminding yourself that creativity is not a special gift, reserved for a limited few. It’s a skill that anyone can learn. 

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Need some help developing a sustainable writing routine? Learn more about my Get It Done program. The group is now full but there is turn-over each month, and priority will go to those who have applied first. You can go directly to the application form and you’ll hear back from me within 24 hours. 

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My video podcast last week explored how to make your content unique. Or, see the transcript, and consider subscribing to my YouTube channel. If you have a question about writing you’d like me to address, be sure to send it to me by email, Twitter or Skype and I’ll try to answer it in the podcast.

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Do you see yourself as creative? We can all learn from each other so, please, share your thoughts with my readers and me in the “comments” section below.  Anyone who comments on today’s post (or any others) by Feb. 28/21 will be put in a draw for a digital copy of my first book, 8 1/2 Steps to Writing Faster, Better. Please, scroll down to the comments, directly underneath the “related posts” links, below. Note that you don’t have to join Disqus to post. See here to learn how to post as a guest. It’s easy! 

Reading time: Less than 4 minutes

I know this may sound crazy, but, for writers, the benefits of boredom outweigh its downsides….

I’m going to ask you to do something difficult.

I’d like you to stop seeing boredom as automatically undesirable, bad or negative. Instead, I ask you to see it as neutral — and then observe yourself to see if this adjustment improves your creativity. (Spoiler: experts tell us it should!)

Did you know that the word ‘boredom’ didn’t even enter the English language until the mid-1800s? Some etymologists attribute it Charles Dickens’ 1852 novel Bleak House in which he described Lady Deadlock as being “bored to death” by her marriage.

But just because you’re bored, don’t assume you are unlucky! Instead, recognize that boredom also gives you opportunities. But to find these opportunities you need to take on another difficult task.

You need to put down your smartphone! Swiping and scrolling (whether on the internet, or through Facebook, Instagram and Twitter) may seem to amuse you. You’re led to believe this fallacy because every time you stumble across a piece of interesting content you get a little hit of dopamine that addicts you to the process. 

According to leading boredom researcher Sandi Mann — author of The Science of Boredom —  smartphones and the Internet are like junk food. “The more entertained we are, the more entertainment we need to feel satisfied. The more we fill our world with fast-moving, high-intensity, ever-changing stimulation, the more we get used to that and the less tolerant we become of lower levels.”

When I read conclusions like that from Mann, I know I am guilty. I’ve had a low tolerance for boredom for most of my life, and I’m the type of person who always has a Kindle in my purse and a cellphone in my pocket. If I’m stuck in a lineup somewhere, I’ll pull out the book or my phone (there, the New York Times is my poison of choice) and amuse/entertain/inform myself by reading. This habit started when I was six years old, by the way. At the breakfast table, I’d read the back of the cereal box, if necessary in French — a language I could barely understand, although my country is bilingual. 

Did you know that the average American spends about 10 hours and 39 minutes each day consuming media? That’s roughly 65% of waking hours, according to a 2016 Nielson report.

I value being really well informed, but I also value having interesting thoughts wandering through my brain. That’s why I’ve been working to steel myself to modest amounts of boredom. When I feel a lack of energy and want to do nothing, I try to go outside for a walk, instead. And when I walk, I try not to always have headphones jammed into my ears so I can catch up with my favourite podcast. And when I’m lounging on my living-room couch after dinner, I try to put my phone down and read a good book, instead. 

But mostly when I feel a little bit bored, I try not to panic. Because, often, boredom is helpful. This is because our brains have a resting state that scientists call “default mode.” And the default mode expands during bouts of boredom, helping us to create, develop, imagine, design and invent. 

If you are wrestling with too many “slow moments” in your life, take the time to embrace them. Keep your phone in your pocket (or better yet, in another room entirely) and allow your mind to wander.

Some people are more easily bored than others, thanks to genetics. If you think that might apply to you, take the Boredom Proneness Scale to find out. (When I took the test the scale rated me relatively low, despite my self-perception of being easily bored.)

And be aware that smart people may have a particularly difficult time embracing boredom but if that conundrum faces you, consider some excellent advice from Cambridge University grad and Monty Python actor John Cleese: “Creative ability is almost completely unrelated to IQ; if you don’t know how to play you will not be creative.”

Also, remember the ‘tip of the tongue’ phenomenon: Whenever you try especially hard to recall a forgotten name or think of a specific word, your brain is especially unlikely to cooperate. Instead, the name/word will spring to your mind unbidden, several hours later, when you’re not thinking about it (and, ironically, when it is almost useless to you.) 

This is simply the way our brains operate. When we daydream, when we doodle while a lecture is going on, when we sit on a park bench and notice the kids playing and the birds singing, our minds start solving problems and making unexpected connections. 

This is the default network doing its job. This is creativity. Our minds do their best work in the un-stimulated, un-entertained state we often call boredom.

This is a substantially updated version of a post that first appeared on my blog on Oct. 14/14.

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If you want some help boosting your creativity and developing a writing routine, consider applying to my Get It Done program. I’ll be holding a no-charge intro webinar about it on March 20/20 and all you need to do is email me to hold a spot. If you already know you want to apply, go here, scroll to the very end and select the bright green “click here to apply now” button.

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My video podcast last week addressed which software is best for writing. Or, see the transcript, and consider subscribing to my YouTube channel. If you have a question about writing you’d like me to address, be sure to send it to me by email, Twitter or Skype and I’ll try to answer it in the podcast.

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What’s your feeling about boredom? We can all learn from each other so, please, share your thoughts with my readers and me in the “comments” section, below. And congratulations to Andy Baldwin, the winner of this month’s book prize, for a Feb. 25/20 comment on my blog. (Please email me with your mailing address, Andy!) Anyone who comments on today’s post (or any others) by March 31/20 will be put in a draw for a copy of my first book, 8 1/2 Steps to Writing Faster, Better. To leave your own comment, please scroll down to the section directly underneath the “related posts” links, below. Note that you don’t have to join the commenting software to post. See here to learn how to post as a guest. It’s easy!

Reading time: Just over 5 mins.

Clients often ask me how they can nurture their creative sparks. Here’s what I learned about creativity when producing my latest book.   

My new book, Your Happy First Draft, required a lot of creative sparks before it was published. But in today’s post, I’m going to talk about just one of them — even though it had nothing to do with writing. I think the idea is ‘translatable’ for writing projects and can help you turn your own spark into a fire.

One of my most surprising sparks was creating a promotional book video. I know almost nothing about video, except the little bit I’ve learned being the writer and voice for my weekly Write Question video podcast. Unfortunately for me, I had the book promo video idea shamefully late in the process — just three weeks before the book was due to arrive in my office. Oy!

By way of illustrating how you can turn your own creative spark into a fire, here are the seven steps I recommend:

1-Have a system for capturing your creative sparks

The best ideas inevitably come at the most inconvenient times. When I had the book video idea I was in the car with my husband. He was driving so I was able to make a note to myself using my phone. I don’t know about you but over the years I’ve accumulated more than 587,287 words in notes to myself (that number represents the length of War and Peace).

There were notes on my computer, notes on my phone, notes in notebooks, notes all over the freaking place. Over time, these notes became tattered and dog-eared and the ones in pencil often faded. Some went through the laundry, buried in my pockets. Others just disappeared, like missing socks.

About two years ago, I declared a STOP to this unsustainable process. Now, as a matter of habit, I always store my notes in Evernote. This wonderful software is free for basic use but I now have a paid membership (at the reasonable rate of $34.99/year). The two best aspects of Evernote? First, it allows you to save web pages with a single click. Second, it is web-based, so it is accessible anywhere you have an Internet connection. I have an Evernote app on my phone — and my phone is almost always beside me — so I can easily file my notes as soon as they spring into my mind.

2-Get the help you need

My son, Duncan, helped me start my Write Question videos so I called him first to ask if he could do the book promo video. He felt it was outside of his range of experience, so I called my friend Stu McNish at Oh Boy Productions in Vancouver. I told Stu how much I had to spend and told him the price was so firm that if I couldn’t do it for that amount of money, I’d have to let go of the idea.

Stu, who is vastly experienced in video, confirmed the price wasn’t enough to hire him, but said he thought one of the junior people in his studio, Greta Gibson, would be a good fit for the project. Two days later, I met Greta for coffee. We sketched out ideas on a napkin and I agreed I’d get family and friends to volunteer as actors.

I knew I wanted the video set to music so I spoke with my son (who is also an opera school grad) who directed me to a royalty-free-music website. I identified about a dozen pieces of music I liked and then sent the top five to Duncan and Greta for their views. Fortunately, they both agreed on the same one!

3-Give yourself mini-deadlines

Just like writing, the hardest most time-consuming work of video is the editing. But before we could get to that, I had to line up my actors and set a date and time to shoot the script.

Figuring out the timing was tough. How could we accommodate the working schedules of the volunteers when the video had to be shot on a weekday? Answer: We worked from 4 to 8 pm on a Thursday night. (Yes, it took us four hours to record a one-minute video!) Figuring out the schedule for shooting was like solving an elaborate puzzle — and sometimes it felt as though a piece or two might be missing.

When shooting was complete, Greta took just five days to produce a rough cut and post it to a private channel so I could review it. Then we went back and forth several times with changes and revisions. In the end, I had the video before the books were in my office. Without mini deadlines along the way, that would never have happened.

5-Focus on the creative sparks

If I had focused on how many books the video was going to sell for me, I would have driven myself crazy. (Besides, how can one ever calculate a number like that?)

Instead, I put my attention onto the stuff that was fun. What could I learn about video-making? How could I help ensure the video looked great?

It helped hugely that three of the volunteers were opera-school classmates of my son. They had acting experience! Also, I was astonished to see what an enthusiastic actress my sister Heather was. (She’s the person who’s ripping up a script.) Where/when did she get those skills working in marketing for law firms, I wondered? And my coworker Jen likes to draw. A funny coincidence that I’d assigned her to the role of drawing when I didn’t even know that was one of her natural talents.

If you want to write, don’t focus on the publication problem while you’re writing. That should be a job for another day. Do the creative work first.

6-Make sure your ‘well’ is full

It’s impossible to do creative work if you’re stressed to the max. I always advise my clients to make sure they’re getting enough time for themselves before they tackle anything that’s creatively challenging.

Are you getting enough sleep, I ask? (Adequate sleep is essential to creativity.) Do you have time for coffee with friends? Are you getting enough exercise? Are you seeing enough movies? Going to enough concerts? Reading enough novels? Having enough time to sit on the couch and stare into space, without having anything else that you need to do?

I call this type of activity a writer’s ‘well’ or ‘bank account.’ If you have enough ‘water/money’ saved up, you’ll be able to ‘spend’ it on your creative output. If you don’t, you won’t.

It was hard for me to keep my ‘well’ full when I was in the final stages of my book, and producing the video to boot. But I focused on getting enough sleep and reading fiction. Both of these activities sustained me.

7-Put your doubts on hold

So many times, I came close to cancelling the project. Doubts ate me alive. So I did what I advise my clients to do: I forced myself to procrastinate on the question of quality. I said to myself: “It’s either going to be fabulous or a piece of garbage. I won’t know until I see it.”

When I viewed the rough cut, I breathed a huge sigh of relief. It made me feel happy and cheerful. Just about everyone else who viewed the video in advance felt exactly the same way. Success!

My thanks to Greta Gibson (pictured at the top of this post) for the superb work she did and to Stu McNish for steering me in her direction. (Like me, Stu and Greta also make Hitchcock-like appearances in the middle of the video.) The video was a great creative challenge but also highly rewarding.

If you want to be a writer, I highly recommend taking more creative risks like this. In other words, the next time you get a creative spark, don’t let it just flare up and die. Use these tips to help yourself build a bonfire.

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If you want to encourage your own creative sparks — or write a book, thesis or dissertation — consider applying to my Get It Done program. I’m holding a no-charge webinar Thursday, Oct. 17 at 1 pm Pacific to introduce you to the principles I teach in the program. Register by emailing  me.  If you already want to apply to the program,  go here, scroll to the very end of the page and select the bright green “click here to apply now” button.

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My video podcast last week aimed to help writers find their voice. Or, see the transcript, and consider subscribing to my YouTube channel. If you have a question about writing you’d like me to address, be sure to send it to me by email,  Twitter or Skype and I’ll try to answer it in the podcast.

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How do you foster your own creative sparks?  We can all learn from each other so, please, share your thoughts with my readers and me in the “comments” section below. Anyone who comments on today’s post (or any others) by Oct. 31/19  will be put in a draw for a copy of my first book, 8 1/2 Steps to Writing Faster, Better. Please, scroll down to the comments, directly underneath the “related posts” links, below. Note that you don’t have to join Disqus to post. See here to learn how to post as a guest. It’s easy!

Reading time: Less than 4 minutes

Do you ever feel that all you do as a writer is pay dues? If you’re feeling impatient for writing success, here’s some timely advice from actor Ann Dowd….

People I know sometimes talk about writing a bestseller. They usually say it in a joke-y kind of way, but in their secret hearts, I can tell it’s something they desire.

Your own goals may be more modest. Perhaps you want to finish your book? Or have an article published somewhere prestigious like Fast Company or the Harvard Business Review?  Or maybe you want to make your hard-to-please boss happy with your words? Whatever your writing goal, I know it’s hard to exist in the liminal space between what you can do and what other people recognize you for.

Have you ever thought that actors face the same type of challenge, only to a much more daunting degree? After all, it’s possible to write without being published. But it’s not possible to act without being seen.

Ann Dowd (pictured above), is a 62-year-old actor achingly familiar with this particular problem. You may know her today as the fearsome Aunt Lydia on the award-winning Hulu series The Handmaid’s Tale. But she was 56 years old before her acting career could be called successful. She started her working life intending to become a doctor and instead, switched to acting, spending several years performing in regional theatre in Chicago before moving to New York City.

She had large roles in small films (e.g. Shiloh) or small roles in bigger ones (e.g. The Manchurian Candidate) and guest appearances in many TV shows like Law & Order. Even though she did Broadway three times and earned a rave review from the New York Times for her role as Sister Aloysius in Doubt, her career didn’t take off until she was cast in the 2012 film Compliance.

Reflecting on fame’s late arrival in her life, Dowd spoke at the 2018 Glamour Magazine Woman of the Year Summit held in Los Angeles in November. I think her words might offer reassurance to many writers.

For example, consider Dowd’s “origin” story, which shows her (unwisely) comparing herself to others.

“When I was a young actress,” she recalled, “I was on the way to my waitress job in my black pants and my white shirt and my black tie—glamour is not the word that would come to mind at all. Feminine? No. Nothing. I looked across the street, and there were several limousines parked outside the theater. And I looked at the marquee, and it said, “About Last Night starring Elizabeth Perkins,” who was my classmate. I was going to wait on tables, and she was going to a premiere of her film that would launch her into stardom. I got through the shift, and I went home on my porch, and I wept and screamed into the night, “When?! When is my turn?”

Her turn wasn’t until 26 years later, and here is her advice for anyone struggling with the in-between years. I think it’s equally useful advice for writers:

• “Keep your love story alive—and by love story, I mean the love you have for the work that you do—for it is a pure and powerful dynamic, and it will sustain you. Pay attention and take care of it. We are here to do the work we are able to do, the work we love to do.
• “Celebrate the small victories. Every time I got a role, I thought it was the greatest thing in the world. I didn’t care if I had two lines or if it was a Broadway opening, which was thrilling. I thought, Oh my gosh, someone said yes. Someone said, “I see. I agree with you. Go on now.”

• “Stay humble. Stay grateful for every single day and for all that goes on in that given day. I can tell you from experience there is nothing worse than an ego gone wild.

• “Take many trips out of your head and into your heart and soul. That is where freedom lives. That is where lack of judgment lives. And that is where hope and love thrive. It’s a very good compass, that heart and soul. Consider it as often as you can.

• “Put [your phones] down. I promise you this: The answers come with the silence. In the quiet. The answers for you and the secrets that are yours alone to know come in the silence. You don’t find them on the phone or in the computer or on the television.

• “Let the world know in no uncertain terms what you plan to do. Don’t obsess about the details of how. Just let the universe know, “Excuse me. I’m coming. I’ll be here in a minute. And thank you.”

• “[Finally], you do not have to be the best. That’s a whole lot of pressure, darlings. Say no to it.”

I found Dowd’s advice so wise and her story so inspiring I decided to share it with you. (You can see the whole piece here.)  As we move into the end of 2018, remember that you cannot control how your work is published or how readers react to it. You can only control what YOU do, what YOU create. Don’t let the reactions (or lack of reaction) from others have any impact on you.

And pay particular attention to Dowd’s advice about putting down your phone. The answers to your writing problems always come with silence, not with text messages, emails or games.  

My thanks to Vancouver theatre critic Colin Thomas for sharing the Ann Dowd story in his weekly newsletter.

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My video podcast last week gave advice about whether it’s a good idea to hire a copywriter for your website.  Or, see the transcript, and consider subscribing to my YouTube channel.  If you have a question about writing you’d like me to address, be sure to send it to me by email, Twitter or Skype and I’ll try to answer it in the podcast.

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How are you at waiting for success? We can all learn from each other so, please, share your thoughts with my readers and me in the “comments” section of my blog. And congratulations to Jonathan Tombes, the winner of this month’s book prize, Personal History by Katherine Graham for a Nov. 30/18 comment on my blog. (Jonathan: please email me with your address!) Anyone who comments on today’s post (or any others) by Dec. 31 will be put in a draw for a copy of  The Hidden Life of Trees by Peter Wohlleben. To leave your own comment, please, scroll down to the section, directly underneath the “related posts” links, below. Note that you don’t have to join the commenting software to post. See here to learn how to post as a guest.