I sometimes think that the brain is a factory.
Which is good and bad at the same time.
Factories have to always be on to be productive and profitable but on the other side. If there’s never a break. Everything else will break in time.
And that’s our brain too.
Your brain aka creative mind is more like a temperamental houseplant that occasionally needs to be left the hell alone.
You think your best ideas come from that seventeenth straight hour of staring at your screen, eyes bloodshot, fingers cramping, soul leaking out your ears? They don’t. On top of that. Drinking more coffee also wont’ fix it…
Our meat computer is a weird device that sits inside of your skull box and those two things that sit on the side of your face, also know as ears might need this message:
The creative mind needs fallow periods. It needs them like your lungs need air. Your subconscious is doing the heavy lifting while you think you’re being “unproductive.”
It’s connecting neural pathways, sorting through the garbage pile of information you’ve crammed into it, and occasionally. Especially when you get out of its way…
You’ll find it handing you something brilliant on a silver platter.
If you open up any social media platform, you’ll see that we’ve all been programmed to believe that constant output is the measure of our worth and that’s bullshit.
Those guru’s will say some stupid shit like “That if we’re not producing, we’re failing.” Or that “That resting is weakness.”
It’s hustle culture horseshit pushed by people (GARY V) who are too afraid to be alone with their thoughts for more than five minutes.
Rest isn’t just necessary. It’s fucking sacred and thou shalt rest because…
Your creative well is not bottomless.
You can’t keep drawing water from a dry well.
Every idea you birth, every project you complete, every sentence you craft. They all drain something from you that needs replenishing. And scrolling social media or watching YouTube tutorials about being more productive isn’t replenishment.
You can look at it as a different flavour of exhaustion.
Burnout doesn’t announce itself with a polite email and when it comes, it steals not just your ability to work, but your ability to enjoy anything at all.
I’ve watched brilliant creator friends of mine turn into hollow eyed zombies because they ignored the warning signs. Because they thought they were special. Immune. Built different
(Or whatever the cool kids on YouTube and TikTok are saying now)
Nobody is.
Your best work requires depth, and depth requires space. When was the last time you looked up and just stared? Or took a long walk without your phone? Or read something that had nothing to do with your industry?
These aren’t luxuries. They are things you NEED to do.
Yeah I get it that we have deadlines or followers or bills to pay.
It’s okay to put down your tools. Close the laptop. Step away from the desk. Go outside. Touch grass. Read a book. Cook a complicated meal. Take a nap. Have sex. Stare at clouds.
The aim is to do something.
Anything really, that fills rather than empties you.
Now while I’m gonna hop of my soapbox and do as I wrote by resting.
I’m getting into bed before 9pm. It’s 20:40 as I’ve hit send.
And I’ll be watching A Thousand Blows till I pass out
Now go rest.
Stephen Walker