Blogocentric Formulations

Thoughts and habits not conducive to the work

I just finished The Creative Act: A Way of Being by Rick Rubin and while it was... not really what I thought it was (full review is forthcoming for the "Book Brothel" )... I did find one particular piece of it really useful. Rick Rubin put together a list called "Thoughts and habits not conducive to the work" which I thought was worth posting here.

THOUGHTS AND HABITS NOT CONDUCIVE TO THE WORK:

1. Believing you're not good enough.

2. Feeling you don't have the energy it takes.

3. Mistaking adopted rules for absolute truth.

4. Not wanting to do the work (laziness).

5. Not taking the work to its highest expression (settling).

6. Having goals so ambitious that you can't begin.

7. Thinking you can only do your best work in certain conditions.

8. Requiring specific tools or equipment to do the work.

9. Abandoning a project as soon as it gets difficult.

10. Feeling like you need permission to start or move forward.

11. Letting a perceived need for funding, equipment, or support get in the way.

12. Having too many ideas and not knowing where to start.

13. Never finishing projects.

14. Blaming circumstances or other people for interfering with your process.

15. Romanticizing negative behaviors or addictions.

16. Believing a certain mood or state is necessary to do your best work.

17. Prioritizing other activities and responsibilities over your commitment to making art.

18. Distractibility and procrastination.

19. Impatience.

20. Thinking anything that's out of your control is in your way.

For anyone who struggles to write or otherwise complete creative endeavors... see anything that hits home? There are a lot of them that apply to me, but #6 and #9 and #13 and #17 and #18 are things I really struggle with. I think #6 and #17 are probably the core underlying problems, and the other three are manifestations of how those underlying problems play out. There are some other ones in there that I also definitely struggle with, and it's easy to see how one or more of these could quickly derail someone's ability to create art.

One of the things I've been thinking a lot about this month as we head into the end of the year is what I want to accomplish next year. Every January, I think about goals for the new year and what I want to accomplish, and they're always some lofty thing that's tied to specific achievements (see the first part of #6). In preparation for next year, I'm trying to think about where I'm at right now, and an achievable goal I can reach that isn't some nebulous or arbitrary thing like, "Finish writing a book" or "Write X number of pages, words, etc." ... I'm thinking about how to go from near-zero to "back in shape."

The same is true for me and physical exercise. I'm not at the point where I can think about wanting to run a marathon, or lift a certain amount of weight; I'm at the point where I'm severely out of shape and need to get back into healthy habits. The thing I like about lists like the one Rubin provided, is that they often name the hurdles we struggle with. And naming things can take away their power. Rubin's book is definitely one of those "take what works or makes sense to you and discard the rest" kind of nonfiction title, and this list is probably the best thing I've taken from the book. I anticipate referring to it a lot in the future, whenever I need a reminder of the habits I'm falling into that aren't conducive to what I'm trying to accomplish with my writing.