7. Habit

If you are doing some kind of creative work, be it programming, design or art (especially art) — there is a high chance you’ve had times when you want to create something, but you can’t. You may be frustrated and you just want to lay on the bed and consume the content on Netflix the whole day. Or you feel that you need inspiration, and you are waiting for it to come to you. Or you don’t like your work and you are waiting for better idea. Some people call this condition a “creative block”. And it is very hard to overcome. The problem is, your imaginary muse will likely not come to you.

What does it mean: “to overcome” a creative block? It means that you’ve waited for long enough and now you are praising yourself for some wonderful creation. But your brain won’t do it, because it’s afraid. So the harder you are trying to overcome the creative block, the more power it gets.

Therefore, you should commit to shipping every day. Create at least one thing you suck at every day. It doesn’t have to be pretty, it doesn’t have to be a masterpiece, you just should create it. And if you do it every day for long enough — you will probably become very good at this. That’s why this and many other platforms exist. They challenge you to overcome your doubts, your overthinking and simply make a thing.

There is an advice from Seth Godin who inspired this article. He says that you should build a habit:

Regularly find generous work that scares you.

Now I use this advice every day to prioritize what I do. If something I do isn’t generous but is “selfish” — ditch it. If it doesn’t scare me — better do something else. This is difficult but after I heard it I realized how much generous work that scared me helped me in life. Everything that was scary and was not about me but about solving other people’s problems made a huge impact on me. And I wish it will do the same for you too.

Originally published at 200wordsaday.com.