I have updated all of my Creative Work Problems Comics Posts on this blog!
I uploaded them for a while to Instagram and my blog as solo posts. When I did them, I mostly just posted the comic itself, and rarely some more information about it. Well, now I’ve updated them all and added additional help and knowledge for almost every topic. I’ve also updated the name of the post so that it’s no longer named after the comic. Each topic is now more easily identifiable by the title of the post. You can now search the hell out of this site if you are looking for a topic you need help with.
I have listed below every post I have made with these comics in it. So if you’re interested in more information about a topic you see at the bottom of the list, don’t hesitate to go there.
Sometimes you are working on something till there comes this point where you can’t move on because you are afraid to destroy your current process. One way to tackle this…
With this method, you can start your creative work with ease. You can begin with no motivation at all, there is almost no resistance you encounter when you start working…
Becoming aware of things is difficult. It is even more difficult to recognize your own problems. But this is often the case in creative work. Problematic things are taken for…
Sometimes you procrastinate because a big task looks intimidating. If this happens break the task up. Do everything one by one and you will be less scared of the task!…
Sometimes we are in a creative lockdown. Maybe because we are in a real lockdown or because we experience a creative block. Then it is time to take a break…
Do you think you are not doing enough? Do you feel behind and everyone is more productive than you? This week’s topic of the Creative Work Problems comic series covers…
This week’s topic of the Creative Work Problems comic series is the difference between Leonardo Da Vinci and you. You probably think that he was the best of all time…
You hear stuff everywhere that you have to do this or that. Criticism of your work or just how you should be creative. Maybe you are not productive enough and…
A big project or something else really big can be overwhelming sometimes. There are so many things to do that the whole project looks like a really big dangerous wave.…
For months I felt numb to what I was doing, there was no fun anymore. I didn’t enjoy my dream job anymore. Maybe that’s a bit of an exaggeration because I didn’t hate my job. I just lost the passion for what I was doing and that was a little too much for me.
The problem with not having fun at work is that you automatically get less done and get bored quickly. In other words: I was no longer productive. So I asked myself how I was going to enjoy my creative work again, and actually, I was able to answer that question, and I managed to have fun again. My dream job was saved!
How I did it, and how you can do it too if you’ve become numb to your creative work, is what I’m going to tell you in this short blog post.
Things that are fun
One of the reasons I wasn’t having a good time wasn’t because of a boring work process or a stressful client. In those moments, it can be normal not to have fun, even when you have your dream job. My place of numbness was in doing things I used to enjoy a lot. Working on things I wanted to make, sketching wildly, and creating new creatures and worlds, to name just a few. None of it was as fun as it used to be. As a result, my own deadlines on all my projects were clearly dying.
How did I start to enjoy it again? And how do you get the fun back? By doing these three things today:
Thing 1: Make an effort.
Sometimes we do work that we can’t identify with. Less so when we are doing our own work, and more so when we are doing work for others. But even when we do it for ourselves, we may feel that it’s not our work. This happens when we put less effort into it.
According to Yu-Kai Chou in Actionable Gamification, it is important to own your work in order to enjoy it. We need to be in control of everything we do. When we put less effort into something, we own it less. Therefore, we enjoy it less. I have noticed this with my own work. This insight has helped me tremendously, and it is such a simple trick.
Practical action: Put more effort into your creative work and you’ll enjoy it more.
Thing 2: Telling yourself it’s fun.
Here comes a piece of behavioral therapy. Because we tell ourselves it’s not fun, our brains change (no joke) and we train ourselves not to enjoy it. Even if we don’t believe what we tell ourselves, our brain changes for the better (or worse)! This is another simple trick that has helped me so much.
Just tell yourself: This is fun! I love this work! Or even when it’s difficult: This is difficult work right now, but this is what I want to do and it’s fun. This will change the structure of your brain (I’m really not kidding) and after a while, you will automatically enjoy your creative work more.
Practical action: During a difficult phase of your work, tell yourself that you enjoy it and want to do it.
Thing 3: Create systems that celebrate your accomplishments.
Whether it’s checking off to-do items or something else, when you get something done, you should celebrate your accomplishments with systems created specifically for that purpose.
I created a level system where after 30 points I move up a level and get to draw a lottery ticket with rewards. A record system also helps: If you want to paint for an hour every day, keep track of it, and after a while, you can visually see that you have a winning streak. You will automatically try to keep this streak going. That way it’s more fun to stick with it when motivation isn’t there.
Practical action: Create systems for your successes that can make your creative work more fun.
Conclusion
These are my top three things that have put the fun back into my work. They’re so simple, it’s almost silly that I (and maybe you) haven’t done them before. If you’re not having fun, these things can help you put some fun back into your creative work. Give it a try, you’ve got nothing to lose!
Oh, how we know that feeling. We’re working on our creative thing, whether it’s comics, drawings, or something else, and we just can’t come up with any good ideas. Our mind is empty. It seems that only shitty ideas are left in our heads. But it is important, especially in our creative work, that we can generate as many good ideas as possible because the variety of our work is what we need to make good things. Without many different (good) ideas, there will be no good creative work. And this is where we sometimes struggle. Just generating good ideas.
So how do we do that? We have to distinguish between two things: Belief in the process and techniques for generating ideas.
Belief in the Process
Belief in the process is critical to idea generation. Because sometimes we don’t do the right thing to get the right ideas. We sit around and wonder why this creative thing just doesn’t get better. Why does THE idea never come? We have to believe in the process and this is divided into several areas.
Area 1: Trust in Bad Ideas
We have to remember that not every idea we generate is good. We dig and dig and just come up with nothing good. But there may be one good idea among hundreds of bad ones. It doesn’t matter how many there are. The important thing is that we know we just have to keep working on possible ideas so that eventually the good ones we need will come. And they exist. You know they are somewhere because you have had them in the past. Believe in it! Deep under all that crap is something we can use. So let’s keep digging!
Area 2: Belief in Working on the Bad Ideas
Depending on the creative work you do, the process of turning bad ideas into something is important. For example, in drawing, sometimes the ideas come only when you start drawing. The same can happen with any creative work. If you make crap, at some point the idea of how to make something good out of the crap will come. Sometimes, even if you make a mistake, a good idea can come out of it. It’s very similar to when we have a hundred bad ideas in our heads. But if we work on it and use our hands (or feet, if you can work creatively with them), those good ideas will come by themselves. So: Work on your thing! Don’t wait for a good idea, start working on it and the good idea will come.
Area 3: Believing in Pauses
In addition, the creative process sometimes allows us to take a break. This is important because when we’re not working on our projects, an idea can suddenly come to us. So when things aren’t going well, it helps to just work on something else or take a break. Take a short walk outside, which has helped famous scientists to solve problems. Or get the idea in the shower. Over the years I have learned what is really important when taking these breaks: think about the problem every now and then. If you go for a walk without thinking about your project, you may never get an idea. But thinking too much is not good either, so it is important to find a middle ground.
When things aren’t going well, it’s important to remember these areas and not lose your head. Believe in the process! Believe in yourself! It helps you overcome anxiety and the pressure to come up with the perfect idea.
Techniques and Methods for Idea Generation
While it helps to believe in the process and keep working (or walking/showering) accordingly, good techniques for generating ideas are of course important. So here’s a list of my favorites and a few others. I distinguish between techniques where you don’t have an idea yet and techniques where you already have ideas.
Techniques and Methods Without Ideas
Brainstorming
Just about the best-known technique. And one of my favorites. You don’t have to brainstorm in words! You can sketch, paint, make whatever in a tiny size, and do variations to brainstorm. This will trigger area 2 from before because you are already thinking about ideas and making them. And don’t be afraid to make stupid ideas! Even the worst ones go on this list!
Mind Mapping / Clustering
So I’ve been reading Writing the Natural Way by Gabriele Rico and came across a technique called “Clustering”. It’s similar to mind mapping but you write down the associations of the word you use. So if you need ideas for a topic about trees, for example, you write down the first thing that comes to mind about the word “tree”. For me it is “green”, “leaves”, “book”, “reading”, “free time”, “walking” … etc. Sometimes these associations give you pretty good ideas that even have a deeper meaning. For example, a few months ago I did a comic called “Catch an Eye“. I asked my partner to give me a word and I’d make a comic out of it. She said “eye” and I used the clustering method to get ideas for the story.
Real-Life Experiences
Sometimes we forget that we have a real life to draw ideas from. So if you have a project that could have some connection to your past, search it for good ideas! Sometimes these are the best ideas because they add a personal touch to your project. The second thing is to go to places in real life where you can experience something similar to your project. For example: If you have to do something related to the Middle Ages, go to a history museum.
Word Ideas
If you can get ideas for your creative project from a few words, you could use random word generators on the Internet to get some ideas. You can even combine them. Sometimes when I draw a creature or character, I use some random words to get ideas of what they might look like. You could even point blindly at a book or newspaper to get those words.
Techniques and Methods with Existing Ideas
SO TAME Method
I used this in a Creative Work Problems comic. If you already have ideas, you can use them to get other ideas. Sometimes the bad idea just needs a different form to become good. The SO TAME method is a mnemonic for this:
S – Slice it up
O – Do the Opposite
T – Take something away
A – Add something
M – Mix it
E – Exaggerate it
Pretty much take your idea and do one or more of these things to it. Sometimes you will come up with some very unique ideas. I use it myself almost every day.
Two into One
Sometimes two things should be one idea. To me, that is what an idea essentially is: A mixture of two thoughts. So if you need a good idea, try to combine two things. Do you need a warrior character design? Why not mix a warrior with a baby and make a big baby warrior? Because warriors are “dumb” and so are newborn babies. Voila, we have a nice idea. Maybe this has already been done, I do not know. You can do this with anything that exists.
The “What if…” Method
Let’s say you have a story. But this story is pretty boring and you have no idea how to make it better. Well, there is a method called “What if …”. This method asks a question about an idea you already have. It lets you think differently and add things that you would never have thought of without it.
So let’s do this quickly: We have a story. Say a whale wants to find his true love. A whale that just swims around might work, but … what if … the whale lives in the sky? Now we have a nice setting that makes the story more interesting. And we go on … what if … the whale falls in love with a cloud that looks like a whale? Well, now we have a bad idea. But remember! You need stupid ideas to get to the good ideas. So just go with the “what if” method and you will find the good stuff. You don’t have to keep everything. Maybe with this method, we’ll find a cool story about the whale finding love, but it’s not going to happen in the sky.
SCAMPER Method
I stumbled upon this method while researching this blog post. I haven’t used it yet, but it sounds promising. It is similar to my SO TAME method. This SCAMPER method allows you to think outside the box. The acronym stands for Substitute, Combine, Adapt, Modify/Magnify/Minimize, Put to Other Use, Eliminate, and Rearrange/Reverse. The method involves applying these seven strategies to existing ideas to create new ones.
Substitute involves replacing elements in the idea with alternatives. Combine suggests combining two or more ideas. Adapting involves modifying existing ideas to fit new contexts. Modify/Magnify/Minimize involves changing the size or scale of an element. Put to other uses suggests using a concept in a different context. Eliminating involves removing an element or simplifying an idea. Rearrange/Reverse involves changing the order or direction of elements.
Conclusion
Generating good ideas can be a daunting task, but it is essential for success in any creative field. Believing in the process is crucial because it helps you overcome the fear of failure and the pressure to come up with a good idea. You must understand that generating good ideas is a journey, not a destination, and you must be patient with yourself.
In addition, you can use several techniques and methods to generate good ideas. Brainstorming, Mind Mapping / Clustering, and SCAMPER are just a few examples of the many tools available to help you generate new and good ideas. The key is to experiment with different techniques and find what works best for you.
Ultimately, coming up with good ideas requires a combination of creativity, persistence, and hard work. By believing in the process and using effective techniques and methods, you can generate a wealth of new and exciting ideas that will help you achieve your goals and create good stuff for others to enjoy! Now keep on making!
Since this blog post about “Why your work system needs to adapt” is a bit longer, here are three points you’ll learn from this post:
How to overhaul a broken work system from the ground up.
What my old creative process looked like and how it is now.
Why my work system had to change.
Imagine you are in a moving car and suddenly you have to get out. Why, you ask? The reason is that the car you are in cannot change its destination and you have realized that you need to go to another place. After you get out of the moving car, you expect to be able to continue your way at the same speed as before. But this is not the case, because no one can get out of a car and continue at the same pace. No, you fall at high speed on the bare ground (not fatal in this scenario), get up again after a short confusion (as you do after making mistakes), and look for a new way to get to your new destination.
This analogy applies to our own work system, as I had to experience it myself a few months ago.
For a long time, I took little time to work out most of my illustrations. 3 to 8 hours, sometimes more, rarely less. Over the past year, that has now changed. I’ve been focusing on longer stories now which I’ve always wanted to do. Most of the time I put them aside for these smaller illustrations I could produce almost daily. The problem now was that longer stories take … well … a long time. Doesn’t sound so bad at first, you might think. But that led to a change in my creative process, which meant I had to change my whole work system. To go back to the car analogy: For me, that change meant getting out of a car that was going pretty fast. And I didn’t even notice it.
A work process like an addiction
My brain learned an addiction. And it was those 3 to 8 hours of me doing an illustration. As an example, here’s how the process for my Monster Monday used to be:
I started sketching in the morning, developing ideas. A short time later, the addiction sets in: I have a good idea! The first highlight of the day. Once I have an idea, the first sketch is not far away. Then another sketch, with the light table. And then maybe another, until the drawing is ready for ink. Everything is traced with ink and most of the work is done, another highlight in my creative process. At this point, I’m in an extreme flow. Scanning, correcting the lines, and coloring the illustration is very easy after that. Because I’m in the zone and I like to get things done.
And ta-da: the illustration is done! I like it, I love it and my body is full of dopamine. Give me more!
The sense of accomplishment at each completed step in my old creative process motivated me to keep going. So was the urge to finish the whole illustration. However, when I decided to work on longer stories with correspondingly longer deadlines, this source of motivation was no longer present. The fire that had fueled me in the past was extinguished because the longer time frame for completing each step no longer provided the same sense of accomplishment and satisfaction. This change in my process resulted in a loss of motivation, and I no longer had food for the fire that fueled me.
So I had to change my entire work system. Find a new vehicle to take me to my new destination. I was mentally stressed and lost the fun in my creative work. Extreme pressure on myself led to weeks where I could barely work.
I had to find a way to make the work fun (and addicting) again. How I could be more comfortable with this new process of drawing. To do this, I had to adapt my work system.
Difference between a work system and the creative process.
The work system is a system in which you perform your creative work with the help of information, technology, and other resources. This includes work techniques (e.g., time stopping, To-Do’s, or time blocking).
The creative process is how you do your creative work. With critical thinking, you solve problems in creative ways. Simple as that. Your work system helps you do this work effectively. The vehicle of your creative process.
A step-by-step guide to an overhaul of your work system
As long as you can work, it is helpful to tinker with your work system from time to time. Regular reflection helps keep your system fresh and flexible. Where can something still be adjusted? Where are there difficulties in the work?
Big changes that involve a whole new approach or process however may require a major overhaul of your system. As was the case for me. And here’s the step-by-step guide for that:
Realize that your system needs to be adjusted due to a change (In my case, this realization took months).
Examine analytically how you worked. Check your creative process. What motivated you in the old process? What steps were the highlights?
How does it differ from your current creative process? Can things from the old process be incorporated? Can you transform some of it?
What can be a new motivator in the new work system? What can also be fun? Do your research and try to incorporate work techniques that you may not have needed before that.
All these questions will give you insights about a new work system.
Write down the new system you have made so it stays in your mind and you can make adjustments to it.
Use the new system and think about how you can adapt it every day.
Do a weekly review. What went well last week and what didn’t? Where can adjustments still be made?
With the help of this list, you can find out what your new vehicle will look like, which will take you to a different place than usual.
What helped me
What changes have I made? I’m still working on it and changing it a bit each week, but what has helped so far are the following changes:
I have stopped tracking time while at work, which I used to do for over two years. I’m currently having trouble working through “my hours” (without client work) and the number at the end of the week stresses me out too much. Therefore keeping track of time is counterproductive right now.
I now use Todoist (not sponsored (sadly)), which miraculously keeps me very motivated. Normally, I always wrote down my to-do lists on paper. With this app, I can intuitively enter my tasks with a date and then …. simply forget about them. This is incredibly helpful and calms me down. You can’t “forget” tasks till they are due if you are writing them on paper.
In addition, I write down the most important thing I want to get done during each day of the week. With time tracking, I knew I wanted X working hours every day, and I knew at the end of the week if I had accomplished that. With this change, I can measure if I did the most important task every day.
I’m trying to bring more gamification to my creative work. I no longer have my daily highlights to fuel my fire. Gamification brings me the motivation I need as I slowly approach the highlights. They’re still there, just much further apart.
I started with time-blocking. Every morning I write on a piece of paper what blocks of work I do throughout the day. I’ve found that it gets me into the flow incredibly quickly and makes me less distracted.
Weekly reviews on Monday morning. This is one of the best things I’ve started doing in the last few months. It’s crazy how much I forget, what is good for me. The weekly review reminds me to repeat good things and to do bad things less. It also gives me a kind of benchmark for how the week went. It motivates me and pushes me forward.
I try to do at least 4 hours of deep work every day. I usually listen to podcasts or live streams while I draw. But I’ve noticed that I get distracted very quickly these days. So I’ve changed that, and the background noise can come back in after I’ve done 4 hours of undisturbed deep work. I even consider this a reward.
Conclusion
Every work system is different. Maybe you just need to adjust it a little, or maybe, like me, you want to get out of a moving vehicle to get to a different destination. If that’s the case, I hope I was able to help you notice it and got you some ideas on how to approach it.
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There are various names for this phenomenon — writer’s block, creative block, or art block. I made a list a while back with some suggestions if you have this problem. Today I’ll show you a different approach with an exercise.
This exercise includes a) different steps you do in a relaxed body position, b) mental imagery exercises, and c) a visualization of your art block.
It can also help you solve daily creative problems in your work. For example, if you get stuck on a project and don’t know what to do. That’s why I will test and do this exercise myself too.
I have adapted this exercise so you can do it alone, as it is usually done with a therapist who guides you. This means that I will change this exercise over time with feedback.
What Can Help With Art Block?
There is evidence that vivid daydreaming helps with a creative block. That’s why we do an exercise that enhances this.
We all know when we go for a walk with a problem in our mind, we find the solution before we even come back from the walk. In this sense, daydreaming can help us when we have this issue.
But how can we deliberately start this daydreaming? Of course, we can encourage it by doing nothing and letting our thoughts run free. By doing something other than our creative work and thus letting daydreaming take its course. Or just do something else, like Kness did when she had art block. Or we can apply this solution with an exercise, which encourages daydreaming. As a result, it helps with our creative block.
One part of the exercise is a series of mental imagery exercises that form the basis of the Creative Imagination Scale. I’ll give you this part of the exercise in short, there is a link below for more details.
The Concept of The Mental Imagery Exercise
There are 10 parts to the exercise. Here’s an overview of these parts (the actionable and adapted exercise is further below).
Arm Heaviness
Think about how your arms are getting heavier.
Hand Levitation
Think about how your arms are getting lighter.
Finger Anesthesia
Imagine your fingers going numb.
Water “Hallucination”
Imagine drinking cool refreshing water.
Olfactory-Gustatory “Hallucination”
Think about how you perceive the taste and smell of an orange.
Music “Hallucination”
Listen to music in your mind that you heard the other day.
Temperature “Hallucination”
Imagine your arms getting warm.
Time Distortion
Try to slow down time with your thoughts.
Age Regression
Imagine going back in time, e.g. childhood.
Mind-Body Relaxation
Try to relax your mind and body.
The Problem With This Exercise
And what’s the problem? A therapist should guide you through this whole exercise, while you are in a relaxed state. It is quite difficult to do with no therapist around. Hence, we’re going to change it up a bit and do it ourselves!
Go through the mental imagery exercise before you start it, preferably writing it down, and try to imagine how you do every point of this. Look for personal examples such as point 8 “Time Distortion”. When is the moment in time you will imagine? Then try to remember these points as best as you can.
If you do the exercise and forget a few things, don’t worry! It’s not a problem at all. If you do the exercise over and over again, you will memorize everything and incorporate the forgotten things.
The Exercise Against Art Block
Remember this exercise and then let’s do this!
Sit in a dark room with your eyes closed and focus on relaxing your body and mind.
Now describe to yourself the contents of your ongoing thoughts and fantasies.
Do the mental image exercises as mentioned. No more than 1.5 minutes for each exercise.
Arm Heaviness
Hand Levitation
Finger Anesthesia
Water “Hallucination”
Olfactory-Gustatory “Hallucination”
Music “Hallucination”
Temperature “Hallucination”
Time Distortion
Age Regression
Mind-Body Relaxation
Now visualize or otherwise experience the elements of your current creative work. Imagine your creative block. What do you want to work on right now? What are the problems and solutions to this? How do you move on?
Come back to reality. Stretch your limbs. Breathe deeply. Open your eyes.
Repeat this daily for two weeks or more. You can do this as a ritual before doing (or trying to do) any creative work.
Conclusion
While there are many ways to tackle a creative block, I am trying to give you a new, evidence-based approach. I have adapted this exercise for you to do on your own, so we need more evidence to see if it works without help. If you have someone to help you, you could use the real exercise down at the sources.
Because this is a work in progress and I’ll continue to adjust the exercise after feedback. So, if you do the exercise for a while, it would be super nice if you could send me your feedback! I will adapt and improve the exercise so that it is even more applicable and can help you.
Singer, J. L., & Barrios, M. V. (2009). Writer’s block and blocked writers: Using natural imagery to enhance creativity. In S. B. Kaufman & J. C. Kaufman (Eds.), The psychology of creative writing (pp. 225–246). Cambridge University Press. https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511627101.016
Barber, T. X., & Wilson, S. C. (1978). The Barber Suggestibility Scale and the Creative Imagination Scale: Experimental and clinical applications. The American journal of clinical hypnosis, 21(2-3), 84–108. https://doi.org/10.1080/00029157.1978.10403966
