The Rhythms of Life Can Help Your Creativity

There are rhythms to life, the best of which are provided by nature:

We have celebrated these natural, celestial events since the dawn of human understanding.

Our creativity—part of our nature—celebrates these rhythms and feeds off of them.

There are darker rhythms we follow, as well. Unnatural rhythms that bind us and control us, unless we find a way to deal with them and integrate the unnatural rhythms into our life.

The first unnatural rhythm is the week. It was invented by humans and they pretended it was from God herself, who created heaven and earth, yada-yada, over the course of six “days,” and then rested on the seventh.

It seems pretty obvious that this was a ploy to get people to worship on that seventh day, either to gather money to build a temple, or maybe to get us to invent donuts so we had something to eat after church service.

All that worship stuff is fine. I’m not trying to bash it. I’m sharing what I know about productive creativity, and getting your art done week-by-week.

I mean, our civilization lives by the week, so we may as well do our art by the week.

Once business became the dominant religion of America, the “work week” was introduced. It was a lot like the original version of the week (six on, one off) but they gave us Saturday afternoon off, as well.

I think all the bosses got tired of showing up to work on Saturday morning, so they quit that and the current work week (five on, two off) was born.

Anywho, that’s what we have to deal with now if we want to get any writing or art done: days, weeks, months, seasons, and years.

Given these rhythms, here’s one approach to getting stuff done:

Yearly Plans

I make an annual plan to set some goals for projects I’d like to complete. It’s things like novels, stories, and humor pieces I want to write. Websites I’d like to build, or businesses to launch.

This blog, Renewable Creativity, has been mentioned in my annual plans for the past four years, beginning as an amorphous “blog about something I care about” and evolving to what you see here now.

Seasonal (i.e., Quarterly) Plans

I take the yearly plans and fit the goals into one of the four quarters. Starting with the first quarter (gloomy winter) I create project plans for each, and figure out some milestones to reach to realize the goal.

Obviously, whatever project is dearest to my heart is taken on first; lesser projects are slotted in later in the year.

Monthly Plans

Every month, I break down the quarterly milestones into specific tasks to complete, reviewing progress made, adjustments to the plans, and accounting for family or work events that have to also get done.

Weekly Plans

Here is where we get into the nitty-gritty of getting stuff done. It’s the weekly plan that needs the cunning and cruelty of a boss (me) trying to get his workers (also me) to do stuff.

I have a week-at-a-glance journal where I block out my time on the day job, the family or fun events coming up, and figure out when I can do my art (write).

I have a todo list on the left side, and I check those items off as they’re completed.

Day

Every day, I journal in the morning to gather my thoughts and remind myself why I love being a writer (because I enjoy telling stories).

I look at the weekly plan and figure out what the day is going to be like, and what I’d love to get done.

It wasn’t always like this for me. I used to fret and worry about how to write things, how to find time, and I struggled to complete projects. It all seemed overwhelming, chaotic, and impossible.

Fifteen years ago I took a workshop with a creativity coach, and learned how to do the annual, big picture planning. My processes kept refining until, around ten years ago, I settled on this rhythmic approach: year, season, month, week, day.

Now I get stuff done. Sure there are rough days, and rough weeks. A year ago, I had two rough months and had to reset my approach (it worked!).

Even with my cancer surgery this year, I was only not writing for about three days. I attribute my productive creativity to this rhythmic approach.

I mentioned it took me a while to grow into this system. If you don’t know where you are, the best place to start is with annual goals.

Actually, it may be better to start with the rest of your life, as in: what do you want to create before you die?

It’s fine to be a creative spirit who creates as they go. If that’s your thing, keep going.

But if you feel overwhelmed and worried you won’t ever complete the work you feel is pushing to burst forth from your soul, start planning.

To close the loop on the rhythms, the second unnatural rhythm created by humans is Daylight Savings Time.

They make us change our clock twice a year to take better advantage of the sun. Really, it’s a crock of shit, and was probably invented by some guy who thought it would help the productivity of our thrifty workforce or whatever.

I think it’s dumb.

This newsletter is about helping you figure out how to be creative in the way you want to be. I learned the hard way how novels need some planning, and I assume other large-scale art does too.

Use the natural (and one unnatural) rhythm of human life to help you create.

I think it’s the best way to praise the creator of this universe, whoever she is.