Creativity — How to start writing/creating

“Well, you may not know this, but there’s things that gnaw on a man worse than dying.” — Open Range

Preface

I’m a HUGE fan of Felicia Day. I enjoy everything she publishes, literally everything. I’ve been tuning in to all of her channels for years now and I participate in her gaming streams on Twitch (#teamhooman). If you don’t know her, well you’re missing out.

So, when Felicia compared the writing process to gaming in one of her youtube videos I watched and I learned.

These are her five paraphrased steps:

Do the tutorial. Read some books. Learn the process.
Start at level 1. Do daily writing prompts “just 10 minutes per day” to train your mind to think creatively.
Join a group of friends “a guild” :)
Know yourself. Figure out what “your own truth is” through journaling.
Do it. Make progress every day. No matter how bad it is just finish (hit the publish button).

Watch her short video to see her explain it in her own words.

Obviously, the gaming metaphor (and the video) makes it a helluva lot more entertaining than what I’m about to present, but there is a lot more to talk about on starting to write and creativity in general.

I’m publishing this as open advice, the take it or leave it variety. I’m not a writer in the traditional sense. As a software developer my writing is intended for an unforgiving insular pedantic audience, the CPU, but I consider myself a creative person. Software development is a surprisingly creative process. Felicia’s advice is the inspiration for this list. She’s smart, some sort of a genius. I love* her. I probably have some serious problems in this regard. I should get that checked out.

*love is a strong word choice. Pre-advice: don’t be afraid of your base emotions; there be gold in them hills. Anger, love’s dirty cousin, is another motivator you could use when it is directed at the work. Never point that emotion at another person. It is vile and distasteful and whoever you use it against will never forget. We all get angry from time to time. Put it into your work.

My advice is based on work I did in 2011 on a website called Pricefeeder (pricefeeder.com) which I renamed to Duos (myduos.com) and then abandoned in 2012. The only existing relic of that site, if you’re curious, is at https://angel.co/duos where I put together a very sparse profile of the business. I’m working on other projects right now like Tax Compactor (taxcompactor.com) that are behind schedule and overly ambitious, but despite failures, these projects have contributed to my repertoire and grown
my career opportunities, added new dimensions to my experience as a software developer, added tens of millions of dollars to other people’s bank accounts and grown my accounts as well.

My advice

BE AN EXPERT AT SOMETHING
Be world class at something, preferably something that helps you make a living. It doesn’t necessarily need to be a creative job, but that doesn’t hurt. This is my paternal “go to college” advice, kids. Listen to your parents. Unless you’re a prodigy, and probably even still, go to college. Also, go to the best college you can get admitted to for your chosen profession. If academia kicks your ass hard enough you’ll come out feeling like you can conquer anything. That’ll give you the confidence to be creative and free you up financially to take some risks.
Practical achievements will help you drown out the drum of insecurities in your brain; the drum never stops beating, by the way. In your work, you’re putting out ideas that few believe are true or feasible. You’ll question whether your ideas are valid. Even worse you’ll find out along the way that most people just don’t care. Coming to terms with this without punking out takes a lot of courage and a lot of tenacity.
Felicia is a mathematician… do you think that has anything to do with her ability to produce great television? I’d argue that it has a lot to do with it. You need to develop and trust your ability to solve tough problems, and having proven expertise in a field is foundational. I’m a computer scientist, which has nothing to do with product design, but it encourages me to be creative in grounded ways. I know if, more like when, I fail that I have done all the necessary preparations to succeed. Every positive outcome will have, at minimum, a sprinkling of good luck. Be prepared to confront failure.
FIND A MENTOR
This is so crucial that it should probably be in the #1 spot. Your mentor is going to show you the shortcuts needed to succeed. After all, you can’t run laps around Earth without some shortcuts. How do you find a mentor? Show up to work. Find the smartest person in the building. Start asking questions. This person, if they are truly brilliant, is also extraordinarily creative. They’re creative in the things they produce and they’re creative in the way that they think. This person has the potential to change your life. The social contract is that you help them achieve their goals in a demonstrable way and their integrity compels them to reciprocate by inviting you along on the express lane.
JUST DO IT™
Establish some sort of milestones for yourself. Hit the milestones. Be a shameless cheater when it comes to being happy with your output, because you’ll always be your harshest critic. You must complete work and keep completing work at an unreasonable pace to become truly great at what you’re trying to do.
“The most important possible thing you can do is do a lot of work. Do a huge volume of work.” — Ira Glass
This is true.
BE UNREALISTICALLY AMBITIOUS
After coming to terms with your milestones, lock yourself in a room. Possibly even quit your job to make space for your work. I did both. This part gets a little crazy…
I paid a friend $500 per month rent to work out of one of his spare bedrooms so that i couldn’t be distracted. I didn’t sleep there. I just treated it as an office. I went there most nights & weekends for a whole year and I sat alone in front of the computer and I worked. At this point it’s worth noting that I own a home. My home has spare rooms, some of which have computers in them. I realize that this isolating behavior probably sounds pretty strange. This is the nature of creative work. It’s a bit weird. I discourage people that want to retire comfortably one day from doing this. But I do believe whole-heartedly that solitary practice is a crucial part of bridging the gap, where your output will be forced to sustain your happiness or you will quit.
Does working really make you happy? Time and space will let you know.
FEED YOUR ADDICTION
When you come out of a stretch of work, however long it takes, you’ll be addicted. You’re going to be a different person. In some respects you’ll feel freed because you’ll have a body of work that you can truly call your own, as part of your legacy, but in other respects you’ll be trapped by your desire to keep pounding the bag to get better. This is no joke. You’re now an addict. Coping with your addiction will require more sacrifice. In my case, it involved renting out my house and moving. This is the same house that I refused to work in so I wouldn’t get distracted. My choice was between going into unsustainable debt, actually more unsustainable debt, and risk losing my house or to downgrade my lifestyle. I decided it would be better to prevent losing everything i’d worked so hard to obtain. I was broke. Habitually doing creative work has a cost.
It’s worth noting here that i’m no longer broke. Whatever your financial situation is, it’s always temporary. I work for other people to support my habit, and this is a huge distraction, but i encourage others to do the same. It’s worth it. In order to have some security while I explore new ideas, i do some gigs. Stay out of financial ruins.
TREAT YOURSELF
I’ll tell you, some of the best and most poignant advice I’ve ever received was from my mother during a time of crisis. The timing made this advice so spectacular. I was in trouble. I was deeply depressed like i’d never been before. Despite prior bouts with anxiety & depression, as well as other trauma that was immensely trying, it was the first time in my life that I was seriously considering suicide. Hopefully, it will be the first and the last time that I consider ending my own life. A lot of creative people go through this, so I’ll share what she said because once it embeds deeply into your brain it changes your outlook. She said simply, matter-of-factly, “You have to take care of yourself.” She wasn’t implying that nobody else would help me succeed. She was explaining to me that none of this is even possible without giving yourself permission to be selfish about your health. Put your emotional and your physical health above everything else, including your work, or else it’s over. the world will be there when you’re ready to shine in it. Take care of yourself first.
CHEAT ON YOURSELF
Eventually you’ll probably burn out. The payoff is very often delayed or it gets incorporated into other parts of your career and your life. You’re probably going to need to steal emotional energy from other creative people to get by.
Creativity is like depression in the sense that it comes and it goes, but once you have it it never really leaves you forever. Don’t worry about losing it. Take breaks, smell those mother fucking roses until you’re sick of roses. Don’t panic about losing interest. Let it go for a while. Do some unrelated hobbies to make new discoveries and meet new folks. Learn to appreciate other people’s skills and study the way they work. Open your mind to other experiences whether it be cooking or crafting or athletics, whatever makes you stop and wonder about new possibilities. In my case, I love woodworking. The smells and the sounds of doing woodworking operations fascinates me. The culture around woodworking is just as vibrant as tech, and Youtubers make me feel like i’m part of that community even though i’ve never met any Youtubers in person.
Woodworkers are easily accessible and they’re some of the most creative people on the planet. Here are some that I really admire: AskWoodMan: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCNyOAOTMl5grahBoOEdzBSg Matthias Wandel: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCckETVOT59aYw80B36aP9vw Frank Howarth: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC3_VCOJMaivgcGqPCTePLBA John Heisz: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCMlfKvFrEpzg1PEpTzJDWoA Matthew Cremona: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCDpL0v-Ifie7u05lbfO3zJQ
Clearly Youtube has had a profound effect on me, more precisely the people that publish on Youtube make me very fulfilled. I encourage you to seek community there around whatever extracurricular activities you enjoy, or just co-opt mine ;)
BELIEVE IN KARMA
Even kings can be kind. You are the boss of your own endeavors, but try to be supportive of other people’s creativity. If you care about what somebody else is trying to do help them where you can. Knowing how impossibly difficult these things are, embrace the notion that nobody has an easy time of it and try to make it easier on somebody else. It’ll come back to you when you least expect it.
DON’T GIVE UP
There are going to be a lot of challenges. I shared some of mine with you and no doubt there are others you might encounter. My opinion about this is that when you’re on your deathbed, looking up at the tiled ceiling of the hospital room that you’re about to expire in, you’re not going to want to say to yourself, “I gave up on that really important thing that I know I could’ve achieved eventually.” That would be suboptimal. If necessary, change the definition of success and do that instead, but never give up.

Whatever you are pursuing and however it turns out I wish you happiness and all the luck.

— Eli