The creative process can be a struggle.

Sometimes, you randomly have a hard time, whilst it’s easy another time.

And while that’s partly to coincidence and shifting moods and energy, it can be mostly improved upon.

In this newsletter, I’m gonna be showing you

• how to have a smooth creating process

• how to always have Tweets scheduled

• how to never run out of ideas

So, let’s start!

5 ways to Have a Smooth Creation Process

1. Dedicate more time

You know what feels great while creating?

Having all the time in the world.

The whole morning, afternoon, or even day to do what you love.

It’ll free your mind from everything distracting and will allow you to focus on doing your work.

And even with a job, this can still be possible!

How?

Well, I’m gonna name a bunch of ways, and it’s up to you to take of them:

• taking more days off

• focusing less on school

• spending less time in the gym

• using weekends purely to create

• becoming faster at everything you do

• limiting how much time you consume

• making an hour of dead space in the evening

• limiting how much time you spend with friends

• using holidays, free days and breaks to their fullest

And those are only the first ways. There are gonna be more ways to get time in the second point.

But whatever it is, having that feeling of freedom allows you to become almost playful with your work, like a child with building blocks.

It allows you to be completely grounded in the moment, with pure laser focus, cutting out all distractions.

If you have that, you can easily get into flow state and create at your best.

More time → More flow

2. Get everything distracting out of the way

Do you have a friend’s birthday coming up and need a present?

Do you have a work/school project that keeps nagging you?

Do you have a sink full of dirty dishes that need washing?

All of these distract you from your work. Maybe not always consciously, but it makes you a bit more confused and stressed during your work.

And the solution is pretty easy:

Just get them out of the way.

Yes, it’s gonna be a bit of a nuisance to do all that and it will take up some time.

But in the big picture, it saves more time than it takes - and it gives you a feeling of freedom and satisfaction that - again - allows for flow state.

Now, what are these distractions?

• Having no Tweets scheduled

• Any kind of project with deadlines

• Needing to buy groceries to make dinner

• Any kind of messy/dirty/chaotic surroundings

And there’s a bunch you can do with them.

For Tweets, I just constantly have 4 or more drafts ready to schedule, so all I have to do is click and I’m done.

That removes a lot of stress.

Some people like to tweet on the go since it makes them more “authentic”, but it’s just gonna take up unnecessary time and mental space.

And my easy solution for cleaning is just to do it near bedtime since that’s when I have an hour or so of dead space.

It’s just important that you have as much free mental space as possible when you get to your work the next/same day.

Less distractions → More focus

3. Be strategic, plan your days and creation process

I’ve recently started making SHOT LISTS for my short films.

What are they?

Basically drawings for each shot of a scene and some dialogue written next to it.

And man - it’s been a huge help.

I normally just made up and filmed everything on the spot.

The benefit isn’t just that I get to save time thinking of the shots - but I can also easily align and edit the videos in the order that I wrote.

Just this week, I used a shot list + script for a video and filmed, edited and finished it all in the same day!

That same video would have normally taken me 2 or more.

So - how do you apply this to yourself?

Well, if you’re a movie/video maker, this already should have helped ;)

But for any kind of creator, here are some ways to be more strategic and planned out:

• Have lists of all the things you need

• Think of music/visuals you wanna use

• Do any kind of preparation when you can

• Write notes of things you wanna do on that day

• Visualize/Sketch how you want things to look/sound

• Have folders/notes for all the ideas you wanna make real

• Write every task down the day before you wanna do them

• Write scripts, ideas, outlines in evenings (the most creative time!)

The more of these techniques you can apply, the smoother it’ll go.

This process has helped me start and make many projects smoothly since I have everything ready.

Becoming strategic with your work will make it 3 times easier and will make sure you always have some ideas ready!

But the ideas need to come out of somewhere, don’t they?

So, how do you get a constant flow of ideas?

Well…

4. Fill your creative spirit and be inspired

I pretty much never run out of ideas.

But that’s not because I’m “naturally creative” - but because I watch a lot of content.

And I mean a lot!

On average, I spend an hour a day just watching something - sometimes 2 or more!

But that’s not enough yet.

For everything I watch, I download the soundtracks I love and screenshot any visuals I love.

This has helped me a lot!

Just this January, I struggled to make a video because I simply didn’t know what I would create.

But ever since I’ve made conscious consumption a habit, I’ve been able to consistently create videos every few days.

Now, conscious consumption is a bit different from unconscious consumption (for entertainment only).

Obviously, content does entertain you a bit.

But with conscious consumption, what I do is

• pay attention to the story

• try to think of what happens next

• see story devices, tropes and roles used

• listen to music and visualize how I’d use it in a video

• see which moments really excited me (so I can use them similarly)

• contemplate and write a review of everything I loved about the show/movie

And probably a bunch of other stuff I forgot😂 

But it’s really up to you to decide how you wanna consume.

I personally love to watch movies and shows to feel that atmosphere and translate it into my own videos.

And it can even help to watch/listen/read back to some of your old content and see what you did right there.

That changed my whole approach with videos since I went from producing as much as possible to focusing on creating amazing, crazy experiences.

It’s really funny that you can learn from your past self and become a better creator because of it.

Whatever consumption strategy you wanna follow, make sure you do it consciously and it actually helps you with your content.

And make sure to have some time to bring out those ideas too!

• Walks with neither music nor podcasts

• Half an hour of laying around at night

• Meditation

All of this has become so effective for me, that I literally have multiple video ideas in my head at the same time.

In the last month, I’ve never had a point where I didn’t have an idea what to make.

When you master your idea generation and consumption process, you become infinitely creative.

5. Accept Inner Resistance and Frustration

Most people don’t know this:

Creating at your best is mostly painful.

Yes, the highest points are as fulfilling as nothing else.

But the path there is extremely difficult.

You can go from feeling amazing to being frustrated so bad you wanna give up for the whole day.

And there’s one way that’s helped me solve it:

Detach from feeling good, Focus on creating.

This will make it so much easier because you’re 100% committed to creating, even if it’s a huge struggle.

This can literally 5x your progress!

You go from writing 1 Tweet per 10 minutes to 3 in that time.

Or you go from making 5 seconds of video per day to 30!

And busting through inner resistance gets a whole lot easier when you

Have a vision while creating

When you’re in flow and focused on creating an amazing look/sound/etc., you don’t really care about the pain.

You’re so obsessed that you literally work all day to achieve it.

That’s why it’s so important to create the best projects you can!

A mediocre dumb project won’t make you show up every day willing to bust through.

You need the highest of your ideas to be passionate about content.

Make the following commitment:

Go all out with every big project you have.

It’s not just gonna lead to higher quality projects - but way more motivation too!

Which artist do you think is more excited to work:

The person who follows the same principles and structures every video - or the person who goes all out and makes the best projects he can every time?

Your mind wants to reach the highest of its potential!

And when you are pursuing that potential, you’ll feel so motivated during work that you tend to work through the whole day!

And of course, that leads to a smoother experience during it.

So - make sure to go all out every time. Don’t limit yourself with your ideas at all.

Like we talked about last week, you can achieve your definition of beauty with the right strategy.

So, that closes it off.

Here are all the ways to have a smoother creation process again:

• Make time by cutting low-priority tasks and being faster

• Cut out all distractions, get them out of the way first

• Plan days and your projects with scripts, lists, etc.

• Fill your creative potential, take time often to consume consciously

• Detach from feelings and satisfaction and make the best possible projects

Integrate this in some way and you’ll start seeing way more efficiency during work.

And that’s it for this week!

I wish you the best with your creative work and hope this week’s newsletter helped you.