Daily habits help you grow closer to your ideal creative identity

Daily habits help you grow closer to your goal identity.

So, my older son started Kindergarten last year.

With Kindergarten comes homework. With homework came tears.

We’d sit there at the dining room table, workbooks and instruction sheets splayed out, pencils and erasers at the ready. My then 5-year old was anything but. He couldn’t get himself to to put pencil to paper, to think of an answer to the question, to write his ABC’s.

My gentle encouragement was met by growing frustration, resistance, and eventually tears.

After 15’s of minutes ticked by, I said, “The homework has to get done with or without tears. The faster you let go, the faster the homework gets done. Then we can play.”

As adults, we cry over our homework, too

Anyone with kids (or an acute memory of their own homework aversion) can relate to that childhood nightmare.

So then, why do we continue to cry over homework as adults?

When we want to be a prolific artist, author, musician, YouTuber, athlete—fill in the blank—we waste so much of our time thinking about doing the thing rather than just doing the thing.

And even worse:

We let unproductive, harmful thoughts and self-judgment cloud our creativity.

“Am I really a writer if I don’t write daily at 7:00 AM?”
“I feel guilty when I don’t get enough done in my side gig.”
“I feel guilty when I don’t spend more time with my family because I’m trying to work on my side gig.”
“I’m a failure as an artist.”

Or, we think we need to learn all the things or set up our stations perfectly first.

“Once I get my Notion/Obsidian/Roam/Bear/Apple Notes/Notability flow into place, I’ll be in a good place to start my creativity routine.”

All of these thoughts are a waste of time and energy.

Your negative or unproductive thoughts mean nothing

Negative thoughts mean everything and nothing. As Dr. David R. Hawkins says, “Thoughts are merely rationalizations of the mind.”

If you take a positive thought to heart, you can find growth through affirmation. If you take a negative thought to heart, it can damage your sense of self.

Let go of unproductive thoughts. You’ll find release, which leads to inner freedom.

Just do the thing

What can we do instead? Just do the thing.

Remove the impeding thoughts around the task and just do the task.

Like Ryan Holiday said in his recent Daily Stoic podcast, “The main thing is showing up, doing the work, trying to get a little bit better every single day.”

The original stoics were so much more than philosophers; they were doers. Ryan Holiday cites that historians didn’t believe Seneca was just one person because of how prolific of a creative he was. He was everywhere.

You can have a “multi-hyphenate” existence, too.

You’re on the road to becoming a 10-year overnight success

Each day you complete is a rep.

Just like you can’t expect to be ripped after 1 day of lifting weights, just like you can’t expect to be enlightened after 1 meditation session, and just like you can’t expect a year’s worth of meals to be planned out after one meal-planning session…

You need to show up repeatedly in order to see progress.