Routine! The Unexpected Ally of the Creative Mindy
How embracing daily routine will 🚀 your inspiration
“You 20 minute late. You’re gonna walk in there and say you overslept and don’t have time to dress…” , dialog on ‘The Social Network’ movie
Seriously. Do creative folks really need to be freaks to justify their ‘creativity’ in the eyes of others, or can they (should they!) maintain a strict daily schedule, plan, and all the other things the gurus in top-management books preach? For a long time, the answer was not clear to me, until I figured it out through trial and error. Here’s my story.
The most depressing part of office work as a creative employee was the necessity to adhere to office routines.
- “We’re artists, not assembly line robots,” we hissed at our bosses. But they had a different opinion…
To enter the BBDO office, you had to place your finger. Convenient. Trendy. No card needed. The downside — automatic data collection. Data on each employee was recorded in a database and the traffic manager would compile weekly reports and reports on tardiness and absenteeism…
Perhaps the most vivid revelation after leaving the stuffy office for the freedom of freelance was the feeling of absolute freedom. To wake up and work whenever you please — isn’t that every creator’s dream?
Without a daily schedule, I spiraled into burnout faster than an ice cream melts in the sun — leaving my productivity just as messy. And why? The brain lost its discipline, became lazy, and this resulted in a lack of motivation. It’s a vicious cycle — how do you start doing something when you don’t feel like it?
Creative work requires immense dedication, focus, and consistency. However, even the most goal-oriented authors experience dips in productivity, periods of creative stagnation, and burnout.
Studies in psychology, chronobiology, and behavioral economics show that one of the keys to effective and fruitful work is finding and following an optimal rhythm. In this article, we’ll explore several scientifically-backed strategies that can help you unlock your creative potential and maintain a high level of productivity. At the end of the article, I’ll share how my daily routine is structured, but let’s start with the theory and some simple tips.
Determine Your Chronotype
Hemingway got up at dawn and had a daily word count goal, stopping mid-sentence to know where to begin the next day. Others, like Franz Kafka wrote mostly at night due to his daytime job commitments, utilizing the quiet and solitude that the night provided.
People differ in their circadian rhythms and preferred times of activity. Generally, they can be divided into three chronotypes:
- “Larks” (about 14% of the population) — wake up early, immediately full of energy, most productive in the first half of the day.
- “Owls” (about 21%) — go to bed late and get up late, peak productivity in the second half of the day and evening.
- “Pigeons” (about 65%) — an intermediate type, easily adaptable to any schedule.
Now find your position on the following chart, which I’ve repurposed from Roenneberg’s book “Internal Time: Chronotypes, Social Jet Lag, and Why You’re So Tired”. Also check this video.
Here’s the distribution chart. I’m here, where are you?
Observe yourself to see what time of day you feel the strongest surge of energy and inspiration, when it’s easiest for you to focus. Record your observations and try to structure your work schedule according to your individual biorhythms. Don’t try to conform to someone else’s routine; listen to yourself.
By identifying your chronotype, you can plan your day so that the most important and challenging writing tasks fall during periods of maximum mental activity and creativity. Aligning personality type, task type, and timing yields phenomenal results. “Larks” should write early in the morning, “owls” are best creating in the evenings, and “pigeons” can successfully work at any time.
A study published in the journal “Nature Communications” showed that every person has a unique circadian rhythm programmed at a genetic level. Moreover, these internal clocks affect not just the sleep-wake cycle but also cognitive functions, including creative thinking [1].
Plan Intense Work and Rest Periods
Numerous studies show that our brains cannot function efficiently without breaks over long periods. After about 90 minutes of intense work, there is a predictable decline in attention and mental energy. Therefore, an optimal strategy is to alternate relatively short periods of full immersion in work (30–90 minutes) with rest and switching to different types of activities (5–20 minutes).
See the happiness distribution chart. It is based on research using the Day Reconstruction Method (DRM), created by a quintet of researchers, including Daniel Kahneman. Read more about Day Reconstruction Method.
Your chart will likely differ, but the point is that at the junctions of productivity shifts, you should ‘do nothing, rest, or do household chores (if you are a freelancer) or micro-gymnastics (if you are an office worker).
The most effective 10% of users work according to this scheme: 50 minutes of intense work, then 10 minutes of rest. Micro-breaks of 1–2 minutes every 20–30 minutes are also beneficial — stand up, stretch, take a few deep breaths, or simply focus your gaze into the distance. This tip I got from my mom — I always choose the farthest point and try to see what’s there. For geeks who constantly sit in front of a screen, this is the only way to preserve eyesight. By the way, I’ve had 110% vision all my life.
Psychologist K. Anders Ericsson, who studied the lives of outstanding creators, found that they intuitively practice the method of “deliberate practice.” It involves full concentration on a task for short periods of time (60–90 minutes) followed by rest. This regimen is optimal for achieving peak productivity [2].
Establish a Clear Routine
Creativity is daily work that demands dedication and ironclad discipline. As Somerset Maugham (or William Faulkner, Peter De Vries, and even Raymond Chandler) aptly noted, “I only write when inspiration strikes. Fortunately, it strikes every morning at nine o’clock sharp.”
Develop your own unique daily routine that takes into account your biorhythms and habits. Most importantly, adhere to it diligently day after day, so it becomes ingrained at a subconscious level.
“Clutch to your desk like a lifebuoy in a storm,” advises Henry Miller. “Set a specific time for work and stick to it, even if you spend the first half-hour just staring at the wall.”
Remember, our brain thrives on habit. If you write at the same time for 3–4 weeks, the process will become much easier. Your body and mind will learn to switch into creative mode on schedule.
Habit and routine are necessary for creativity because they free up the brain from making routine decisions and allow you to focus on what’s important. Moreover, regular practice solidifies in procedural memory and becomes easier over time — this is the “Hebb’s Law” in action. It states that neurons that fire together wire together, forming stronger synaptic connections [8].
Combat the “Afternoon Slump”
Even if you’ve found the perfect time for creativity and established a system of breaks, there’s a significant risk of falling into the sneaky trap of the “afternoon slump.” It usually hits between 2 and 4 PM and significantly reduces our productivity, attention, and reaction speed.
What should an author do? First, try not to schedule anything important or creative during this period. Second, make sure to set aside time around 1–2 PM for a proper lunch and rest, including a walk outdoors. Third, consider the help of caffeine (but not later than 4 PM to avoid disrupting your night’s sleep).
Walking can stimulate creative thinking. Researchers from Stanford conducted a series of experiments and found that walking and being outdoors improve divergent thinking test scores (the ability to find new uses for common objects).
Interestingly, walking indeed stimulates creative thought. The Stanford University experiment showed that people generate 60% more creative ideas while walking than while sitting. Moreover, this effect persists for some time after the walk has ended [4].
Naturalist Charles Darwin valued walks so much that he built a “thinking path” near his home, where he retreated to work through complex problems.
Siesta. My ancestors clearly knew what they were doing. A daytime nap can have rejuvenating powers for those engaged in creative work for long periods or under stressful conditions. Even a short 20-minute nap enhances your ability to concentrate, giving your brain a chance to restore depleted energy. An earlier nap with more REM phase stimulates creativity, while a later nap rich in slow-wave sleep physically rejuvenates.
Sleep, especially daytime sleep, plays a vital role in memory consolidation and information processing. Recent research found that even a short nap of 10–20 minutes significantly improves creative problem-solving. Likely, sleep helps the brain “reboot” and look at a task with fresh eyes [5].
A counterintuitive but effective form of deliberate rest is to stop working at the right moment: when you see your next step but decide to leave it until tomorrow. Ernest Hemingway was a known proponent of the practice “always stop when you know what will happen next.” This encourages your subconscious to work through work-related problems during breaks.
Hemingway’s advice corroborates a phenomenon known in psychology as the “Zeigarnik effect.” Its essence is that unfinished tasks are remembered about twice as well as completed ones. Our brain strives to close the gestalt, so it continues to ponder the problem in the background even when we consciously switch to other activities [6].
Create Your Creative Ritual
Many creative individuals resort to certain rituals to get into the right frame of mind for work. These can be simple actions like a morning run, meditation, or a cup of coffee at the desk, as well as more unusual habits. I start by brewing coffee using a Japanese dripper. This brewing process takes at least 10 minutes — during which I manage to do some stretching — right in the kitchen, as I pour water over the coffee.
For example, Friedrich Schiller kept rotten apples in his desk drawer; their smell awakened his inspiration. Victor Hugo wrote naked, aiming to “merge with the elements.” J.K. Rowling began work on each new Harry Potter book on the same day — January 1st.
The idea is to develop your own ritual that signals to your brain and body: it’s time to create! This can help you quickly enter the right state without wasting time and energy on warming up. Start with something simple — light a candle, play your favorite music, drink a special kind of tea. Over time, you’ll develop your own unique set of creative habits.
Scientists have found that the environment we’re in also affects creativity. In one experiment, participants were asked to think of unusual uses for a brick. Those seated at a table in a cafe generated many more original ideas than those tested in laboratory conditions. The secret is that the brain works better in a relaxed and slightly chaotic atmosphere [9].
Don’t Fear Creative Pauses
Ernest Hemingway often compared the creative process to filling a well. Each day we draw water from it, and at some point, it runs dry. That’s when you need to step aside and allow the well to refill. For some, this means taking a walk in the fresh air, for others — reading a favorite book, chatting with friends, or getting a good night’s sleep.
“Writing is the art of applying the seat of the pants to the seat of the chair,” joked Henry Miller. But if we force our brains for hours on end without allowing them to relax and digest experiences, it leads to exhaustion and burnout. So listen to your inner voice and take breaks when needed.
Stanford scientists have found that multitasking leads to decreased productivity and quality of work, especially when it comes to complex creative tasks. The reason is that our brain cannot effectively switch between several tasks at once. Each switch in attention creates a kind of “cognitive cost” that ultimately lengthens completion time and increases the number of errors [3].
Allow Yourself to Change the Rhythm
Creativity is a living and flexible process, and sometimes we need to deviate from our usual schedule. Virginia Woolf preferred to work in the mornings, but when she felt a surge of inspiration, she could write at other times. “Sometimes in the evenings, I am seized by a feverish desire to write,” she confessed in her diary.
Henry Miller periodically changed his daily routine to avoid getting stuck in a rut. “For many years, I worked at night and slept during the day,” he recalled. “But then I suddenly decided to change my usual way of life and started getting up with the first rays of the sun. To my surprise, it bore fruit — I became more productive, energetic, and cheerful.”
Experiment and explore new facets of your creative self. Sometimes changing the environment or time of day can spur the imagination and break you out of a slump. Don’t be afraid to deviate from your usual rhythm if you feel the need. Trust your intuition.
Draw Inspiration from Everyday Life
“The greatest part of a writer’s work is done in the subconscious,” once noted Agatha Christie. “What happens in a writer’s life, their travels, meetings, all impressions — everything accumulates in the vast cauldron of the subconscious, and at the right moment, the plot for a new book emerges from there.”
Many writers and poets are adept at finding sparks of inspiration in the mundane details and scenes of life. For instance, Virginia Woolf could sit in a park, watch passersby, and imagine their destinies, characters, and stories, which later formed the basis of her novels.
Don’t wait for enlightenment from above; it comes when we actively work and creatively perceive life. Train your creative vision: notice the little things, capture interesting dialogues, describe people and nature in a notebook or memory. Take photos. Make audio notes. From this treasure trove of impressions, you can draw ideas and images for your work when the moment is right.
Find “Your” Authors and Learn from Them
Each of us has favorite writers who awe, inspire, and serve as benchmarks. Reread their books, study their lives and creative paths. Pay close attention to how they work with words.
But don’t just read — try copying and emulating their style. Nabokov advised young authors to handwrite pages from their favorite writers to better feel the rhythm of the phrase and the nuances of the language. Ray Bradbury admitted that he learned to write by imitating Henry Kuttner and other masters of fantasy.
Of course, eventually, you need to find your own style and voice. But in the early stages, imitating and copying the techniques of favorite authors can help develop writing skills and refine your style. I admit, I often pester AI with questions about the stylistic or literary techniques of my favorite authors.
Maintain Balance
Haruki Murakami repeatedly emphasizes in his interviews that the key to his writing productivity is daily running, healthy eating, and a full 8-hour sleep.
Sleep, physical activity, social contacts, hobbies — all are essential for maintaining mental health, emotional balance, and creative energy.
Ultimately, the most important thing is to be honest with yourself and follow your unique path and rhythm. As Oscar Wilde said, “Be yourself; everyone else is already taken.” Don’t try to appear as someone else, to write “as you should.” Trust your own voice and vision.
Harper Lee once received advice from an editor to cut out the main character’s reminiscences from “To Kill a Mockingbird” — he thought they were superfluous. However, the writer defended this storyline. “I had to follow my heart,” she later admitted. The novel became one of the greatest works of the 20th century.
As Stephen King said, “A writer should write as he breathes — easily and naturally.” I wish you to find your own creative rhythm and stay true to it. Write from the heart, trust yourself — and success won’t be long in coming.
The principle of a balanced life is supported by the concept of eustress — the moderate beneficial stress experienced during exercise or intellectual effort. Unlike distress (harmful stress), eustress invigorates the body and enhances brain function. However, maintaining eustress is crucially important to “discharge” periodically through rest and switching to other activities [10].
Sleep Unlocks Your Talent
The renowned French poet Paul Valéry, when he went to sleep, would invariably hang a sign on his bedroom door stating, “The poet is at work.” He knew that sleep was a time when masterpieces are born. Not coincidentally, Mary Shelley envisioned the plot for her Gothic novel “Frankenstein” in a dream.
Paul McCartney’s famous song “Yesterday” came to him in a dream, and Keith Richards of the Rolling Stones insists that he composed the legendary guitar riff for “Satisfaction” in his sleep.
Neuroscience has been able to confirm and explain this remarkable connection.
The reason for these “discoveries” in dreams lies in the sleep phase known as “rapid eye movement” (REM). During this phase, which accounts for about 20–25% of total sleep time and occurs approximately every 90 minutes, our brain begins to function in a very special way.
“Sleep is a better creator, far more creative than the waking brain” (John Steinbeck)
During REM sleep, brain activity remarkably resembles that seen during wakefulness. However, there is one crucial difference — in the REM phase, the activity of the prefrontal cortex, responsible for logic, rationality, and self-control, is significantly reduced. Meanwhile, ancient brain regions like the amygdala, which is responsible for emotions, begin to work much more actively. It turns out that in sleep, our brain is freed from usual brakes and restrictions, allowing us to think more freely, imaginatively, and unconventionally.
But REM sleep offers not just freedom of imagination and emotion. Recent studies have shown that during this phase, the brain begins to establish unexpected, distant associative connections between seemingly unrelated areas of knowledge and experience. Thus, in sleep, our brain continues to work on the problems and questions that occupy us during the day but does so in a completely new way, finding unconventional and creative solutions. This is why we often wake up with a ready-made story idea or a sudden insight on how to resolve a particular plot twist.
“Sleep. Dream. Maybe in your dreams, you’ll hear a voice that will make you wiser in waking life.” (Neil Gaiman)
To enter this phase, you need at least 7–8 hours of sleep every night. Sleep deprivation leads to a sharp reduction in the proportion of REM sleep, thereby impairing our ability to think creatively and unconventionally. Moreover, to increase the likelihood of entering the REM phase, try to go to bed and wake up at the same time. This will help your body develop a stable circadian rhythm and improve sleep quality.
It is also very useful to keep an audio dream journal, recording all the interesting images, plots, and ideas that come to you in your sleep. I simply speak everything I dream into voice notes.
Professor Robert Stickgold has demonstrated that during rapid eye movement sleep, the brain forms new associative connections. This happens because, in sleep, the prefrontal cortex, which is responsible for logic and self-control, is turned off, while the brain areas associated with emotions and imagination become more active. Perhaps this is why many creative people get their ideas precisely in dreams or in the liminal state between sleep and wakefulness [7].
“I believe the voices of imagination are in some sense real. They are part of your consciousness, just usually locked away and not allowed to take control. Sleep is a way to crack open the door between these voices.” (Stephen King)
Every writer’s creative journey is unique. Some write at night, others in the morning. Some produce a page a day, others a whole chapter. There is no recipe for success. The key is to stay true to yourself, experiment, and work diligently. By blending work with inspiration, discipline with flexibility, we gradually find our own inimitable creative rhythm.
My routine
I don’t set an alarm clock. Yet, I always wake up early, usually around 4 a.m.
I kick off my day with analysis and learning — anything that fully engages my brain. I transition from analyzing to creating; perhaps an hour of intensive study followed by two hours of creation. Naturally, there are no messengers, social networks, or any of that sort of nonsense during this time.
Then, I take a break, which I’d describe as my morning family ritual. Breakfast, some quality time, and dropping my kid at school. Those with families will understand…
From 9 to 11, it’s my “playtime.” I intentionally don’t do anything specific. I have no set goal. I do what I feel like — of course, within the context of my professional work. If I were a professional artist, this would be akin to sketching out ideas. Exploring forms — not to create something specific and useful, but because it’s interesting.
This approach often leads to something new. About a year ago, I sat at my desk doodling a storyboard for a short commercial I wanted to try styling with stable diffusion. No one asked me to do it; it was just intriguing to me. Once I finished, I realized there was something there. I sent the storyboard to a client with a proposal to shoot the commercial. A month later, I was on set (sadly, remotely), and another month later, the 🎬 was done.
At 11:00 a.m., I start what I call my “Italian lunch” routine, which includes going to the market, playing sports, cooking, and eating lunch. I head to the central market where selecting ingredients is a creative process — I never know exactly what I want to cook, I create it in my mind.
Then, sports. I love playing street basketball. I won’t even consider shooting hoops if it’s drizzling. Interestingly, during this time, sport merges with creativity. Everything I did in the early morning catches up to me, forming a complex structure. Or, I completely disconnect from reality if a team game starts.
After sports, I return home to make lunch. This continues my creative experiment. I try not to repeat dishes; for me, it’s another creative component that provokes and enhances creativity in other areas.
After lunch, it’s time to catch up on messages, hold a meeting, discuss plans with colleagues, delegate tasks — in short, switch from being a creative person to a manager.
And yes, I go to bed early.
So, here’s the deal, folks. If you wanna keep your creative juices flowing like a freakin’ fountain, you gotta find your own groove and stick to it like glue. It ain’t about being a weirdo or a robot — it’s about figuring out what works for YOU.
Wake up when your brain’s ready to rock, not when some stupid alarm tells you to. Take breaks when you need ’em, even if that means snoozing in the middle of the day like a boss. And don’t be afraid to switch things up if you feel like you’re stuck in a rut.
Most importantly, remember that creativity isn’t just about sitting at your desk and waiting for lightning to strike. It’s about living life, soaking up experiences, and letting your subconscious do its thing. So go out there, have some fun, and let your freak flag fly!
Best,
M
Reference:
[1] https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-020-16926-x
[2] Ericsson, K. A., Krampe, R. T., & Tesch-Römer, C. (1993). The role of deliberate practice in the acquisition of expert performance. Psychological Review, 100(3), 363–406.
[3] https://news.stanford.edu/2018/10/25/decade-data-reveals-heavy-multitaskers-reduced-memory-psychologist-says
[4] https://news.stanford.edu/2014/04/24/walking-vs-sitting-042414
[5] https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/28366332/
[6] Zeigarnik, B.V. (1927). Das Behalten erledigter und unerledigter Handlungen. Psychologische Forschung, 9, 1–85.
[7] Stickgold, R., & Walker, M. P. (2004). To sleep, perchance to gain creative insight? Trends in Cognitive Sciences, 8(5), 191–192.
[8] Hebb D.O. (1949). The Organization of Behavior. New York: Wiley & Sons.
[9] https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2012/06/120619225517.htm
[10] https://www.stress.org/what-is-eustress
