Are You Forcing Creativity?
Take It Easy, Let Creativity Come to You
Are you barreling down on your latest design without a clue on what to do? Are you looking to roll out 5 more blog post this week without any topics in mind? Are you generally struggling to come up with any ideas? Your first thought may be to force through the creative process and work it out for better or worse. You keep pushing until you hit a breakthrough. You think if you put enough time and effort into your work something is bound to turn up. Fact of the matter is, what turns up will not be worth all of the agony.
Stay Creative at Your Own Pace
Simply put, if you are not in the mood to do something do not force yourself to do it. For the time being work on something else, stay productive, and avoid getting burnt out on a piece of work that was going no where to begin with. Putting all of your time and effort in a failing attempt to produce something creative will only frustrate you further.
Allow Creativity to Come to You
Creativity comes naturally not forcefully. If your in the shower an idea strikes run with it. Finish up your shower, sit down at the computer, and start rolling out ideas. If your out on the town and creativity strikes again make a note and revisit it later. Creativity can hit at any moment. Learn how to make the most of these moments as well as how to stay productive when creativity is in a lull. If it means working at the wee hours of the night when creativity peaks so be it, just so long as you are making the most of your time and happy doing so.
Stop Bad Habits and Start Build Constructive Habits
Forcing yourself to be creative will only produce sub par results, of which could be completely avoided had you taken some time to unwind. So before you pour that next cup of coffee and get in over your head stop. Think to yourself, is forcing myself to be creative right this second really worth it?
About the Author
Shay Howe
Shay Howe is the man behind letscounthedays. He works as a professional web and user experience designer with a love for creating all that is interactive. Keep up with him on LinkedIn and feel free to follow him on Twitter.
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Working amidst deadlines is definitely a challenge. An idea or a thought can be brought in by constantly stimulating, thinking and brainstorming conversations with people with similar frequency and wavelengths. It can happen anywhere, anytime. We just have to channelize all our activities aligned with the thoughts or vice versa. The Restroom is the place where it has happened to me most of the times:-). Things doesn’t work if I say ” I can’t think of anything right now, we will do something else” in the IT industry which works with processes and aggressive deadlines.
But while I paint, It is just my world and I do it only when I feel.
I agree with your sayings.Creativity can hit you any time of the day but I also believe that creativity comes also with practicing.So apart from waiting creativity to come and find me I dedicate some hours of my week in practicing and in learning how to do things! 
Good point and for my private projects I always try to do that, but in my job when my boss says “I need a cool design for this and that until the end of the week” I don’t have much of a choice. But still if I have a couple of days to finish something and I just can’t come up with something great, I indeed put it aside (but still keep it in the back of my head) and work on something else. And then all over sudden I have THE idea. Doesn’t always work though, haha.
Creativity can not be forced, but it can be stimulated. I tend to have a creativity block when I am working alone, but when I talk about it with other creatives, the creativity comes naturally. Working in a project group or having deadlines definitely works for me.
Great article Shay. That’s the thing sometimes when you have a full-time design job and you have a project that you need to design. Sometimes, creativity just isn’t flowing but you’re deadlines are still there and you have to find a way to get it done. That’s the cool thing with personal projects. You can work on them only when you want to and stop if you’re not feeling it.
I like the point that you make — and honestly, that you’ve made it in conjunction with an old Calvin & Hobbes comic — but I can’t help but agree in large part with Calvin. I’ve had loads of projects where great ideas or spot designs have only come out of hours of thumbnailing, which is often just something you (I) have to sit and make myself do.
And what is with the old stigma of creativity striking between 12:00 – 6:00 am? I’m not one for making generalizations, but surely you know what I’m talking about.