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When you can’t think of what to write, write. I’ll be very blunt with you, I have no plan for the words that will come next from my brain to the keyboard. I just know that sitting and staring at the page well, that’s called staring at the page and what I’m doing now is called writing (typing).
“Just punch the damn keys!” as Sean Connery’s character says in Finding Forrester. It’s damn true. It’s true of so many things. Punch the damn keys, start moving, get going, make momentum. This is true for so much of life. Want to write poetry, start writing poetry. Want to make a song, start making a song. What is the next physical action? David Allen talks about asking yourself “What is the next physical action?” (On this project or task) This is just so true it needs to be tattooed on most of our hands to remember to ask it all the time. What is the next physical action on starting a business? (It’s not buying a domain name that’s for sure!) What’s the next physical action on your job application? Well, I’ll tell you what it isn’t: “Apply for job.” This is not an action, applying for a job is a series of actions and steps. Here’s a series of next actions: Open laptop, open google drive, search for “resume.” These are things you can physically do. Essentially if it’s not as specific as that, then our brains will not be able to tolerate it. ESPECIALLY not at scale. Everything is at scale these days. To do lists, content coming at us from all sides, alerts, spam phone calls and on and on. Your brain needs you to treat it as it is, not as you wish it were. What happens when your brain sees the words “Apply to job”? Your mind probably starts breaking that into smaller tasks, but sometimes this turns into overwhelm because all those tasks (physical actions) can not be done ALL AT ONCE! So ask “What is the next physical action?” So here’s the thing, you might say “When I go for a run I don’t write down on my to do list ‘put on running shoes’ I just write ‘Go for a run.’” Yes of course, this makes sense if you have gone for a run numerous times before, then your brain knows what to do. It doesn’t need you to write the next physical action. What if you are going for your first run ever? Or your first run in a long time? Then you may well need to write down: “Look for my running shoes in the closet.” This helps with creative tasks, this helps with overwhelm. You’ll also be surprised by how many actions you can learn to no longer do in order to get things going.
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Waiting for an answer is the worst. Waiting for someone else to do something is the worst. They probably won’t do it as fast as you or the way you want it. On the other hand, if they do do it, (haha doo doo) and they do it the way you like, well, then you’ve saved hours, maybe weeks of time even and they have achieved a thing. I become “we” and you’re a team of sorts. What is waiting really? When it comes to work or artistic endeavors there is real and productive waiting. For example, when someone let’s say an intern who I’m in charge asks a question over email, many many times I can wait, and I’ll get a response to the effect of “never mind I figured it out.” Why? Why is this? While the answer may vary, I think it is largely due to a culture of relying on others to do our own work. Which is problematic because it becomes a really easy place to make excuses. “I’m waiting for a reply on that…” The unfinished end of that sentence said that people don’t say it “...until then, I’m going to do nothing!” “I’m waiting for so and so to get me that report”, “I’m waiting for a reply from my friend because I’m kinda’ stuck on this project.” Here’s an example from today for me. I’m editing a video for work. It’s pretty good, but not great, the story doesn’t seem to have structure. It’s unclear who it’s for and the premise is kinda loose and undefined. So, I sent a text to two friends in a group saying: can you help me out with this? tell me how to fix it/improve it. The things is...if i walk away for a few minutes, if I take a walk. Maybe reflect and/or write a blog post about waiting (now we’re getting meta) the actual answer I need is likely to come to me from me. No, I don’t mean the muse or magical fairy godmother of creativity I mean the answer is somewhere along the path of bad ideas. Now as I write these I come to see, what I really need. Write down a list of bad ideas and write them until a good idea comes along. A strategy Anyway, back to waiting. Waiting is really a pain. I really like these two terms that are similar: UIHO and UNODIR Unless I hear Otherwise and Unless Otherwise Directed. Two great (similar) strategies both to use on yourself and to use with your team. As a friend of mine described UIHO “It creates a bias for action.” Rather than waiting for instruction (that probably will never come) You say and think, unless other wise directed, I’m going to create this thing, make this video, add these sounds etc. It gives everyone the full empowerment: You to take action (or your team) and the supervisor can say “hang on, let’s do xyz.” While there is no rule that is always true. I have found that in work and creativity, that “waiting” is really code for “I’m stuck” “I’m scared” “I want to postpone.” |
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