Christmas break is never quite as productive as we want it to be, is it? My last column of the semester addressed how to use your break time efficiently, and I hope you did. But Christmas break made me realize something about breaks and productivity: the importance of a schedule.
Often, sticking to a tight schedule seems to be the opposite of a creative and innovative lifestyle. Because creative people are so often associated with eccentric, frazzled and downright weird personalities and practices, it’s difficult to imagine a creative genius with a meticulously detailed Moleskine planner.
Nonetheless, sticking to a schedule or having a daily routine is key to optimizing the time in which you do want to be creative and innovative.
A recent article by 99u, an online magazine dedicated to information about creativity and innovation, discussed the role of routines. The author, a trained hypnotist, said that following a routine can be compared to hypnosis, especially in the case of people who are creators by nature.
If you follow a routine before you sit down to write, design, think or whatever else, and if you do that routine enough, your routine will become associated with the creative mindset. So then, every time you follow your routine, you are primed to be your most creative and innovative.
The author of the 99u article suggested saving a specific album for when you are working, or perhaps writing your to-do lists and ideas in two very separate notebooks. Either way, it’s all about optimizing the mindset and confidence associated with the way certain routines make you feel.
However, it’s important to realize that scheduling is a fine line to walk. The point of this piece is not to make you think you need to have every minute of your life planned out; in fact, it would be detrimental to be so bound by minutes and hours. A routine is beneficial to get you through the stuff you can do on auto-pilot and to efficiently manage time to your benefit. In other words, think of your routine as a way to conserve your energy for something you are really excited and passionate about. Like most concepts regarding creativity, it simply emphasizes a change in mindset.
Overall, make sure you are making time for your creativity. It’s easy to fall into a rut if all you do is follow the same schedule every day with no time to wind down and think, write or create. Remember that the entire purpose of the routine is to make those creative sessions more frequent, fruitful and fulfilling.
