Creative Burn Out and Writers Block

I know some writers or creative humans seem to think creative burn out is made up or a big rumor that they could not possibly be apart of. They wake up at 5 am, no they wake up at 4 or 2am and they just hustle and grind and never stop. I think they are lying to all of us or maybe these rare people exist. But me? I suffer from burn out, I push and push and push until my eyes hurt.

I don’t listen to my mind or body and will continue until sometimes I hate the project and I need a break. Sometimes these breaks are hours or sometimes these breaks are weeks or months. But now I try to take measures to make these breaks shorter or to not need the break at all and actually finish a project (wow! a finished project?!)

I have started taking a step back and thinking about what I need to do to be able to finish this project or maybe finish high amount of projects consistently. Here is what I do.

First Off, Sleep

Yeah I need this dumb reminder and I am sure you do too. Sometimes I will be driving across the country after doing some comedy shows. The gigs could have been amazing or complete trash and I will still be feeling worn out. I will feel completely done.

I will feel the creative burn out overcoming me. I will say things about not doing another road gig or maybe I will cancel some upcoming shows.

I will yap and yap about how its too much on my body or that I hate all my jokes. All this will sometimes disappear after a good sleep in my own bed or a nice Howard Johnson Hotel. How silly.

Second, Switch It Up

If the sleep didn’t work and I am still feeling unfunny, untalented and unmotivated. I will work on something different for the day or week or even a couple of hours. This is why your successful creative friends have a few projects they are working on. Often it is great if they take a different skill set or maybe very little skill set at all.

For example, if I have been video editing for days and I feel burn out creeping up. I will take a moment to do something that isn’t so detailed. Something sloppy like going to an open mic and just ranting about the latest documentary I watched or dusting off old notes out my phone with no plan. Being away from something high pressure and detailed is helpful.

Being away from the computer monitor and being around other comics, friends and saying something silly into a microphone helps. But maybe you don’t do comedy? I am sure you could get this break playing board games with friends or doing a paint and sip near by.

Third, Put It Away

If I am feeling creative burn out on a project or everything. Time to build up a dust collection that would impress any collector. Put it away. Honestly! Oh you had a weird deadline in your head because every book says to be successful you need a deadline?

Yeah I get it, but if you fall too far into the burn out you might hate writing or comedy or cooking or whatever it is so much you never do it again. I have had many friends go too hard into comedy and burn themselves out that they make a big post on Facebook that they are quitting comedy forever.

I do not want this to happen to you, because Facebook post are not as effective as they used to be and also because I want you to succeed.

Put away the project and come back with fresh eyes. This sometimes takes as long as you want. Sometimes I will put away a project and realize the reason I burned out quickly was because I actually didn’t like doing it. That is super helpful info, if no investors or teams are waiting on this project then there is no harm for me to quit and move onto another idea.

If you are anything like me you have a new business idea, new video idea or new skill you wanna learn every day. I am lucky that my girlfriend does not get sick of me pitching ideas like we are in shark tank.

Creative Burn Out – Percent Is Close Enough

Sometimes I am feeling the creative burn out and would rather eat a bowl of wet knives instead of hit publish or export the video or tell the jokes. Sometimes I will turn to my friends and show them what I am working on but too burned out to finish and they will say something like “I thought it was done” or “It looks ready” Honestly, I hate hearing this. It feels like a lie.

There is no way they looked at this rough version and thought it was done. Then I will do one of the following steps I mentioned above and realize it is closer than I thought or they were right and I should just post it.

I read in a book somewhere that 70% is close enough. I am sure there was many beautiful words and chapters explaining how overthinking or something leads to trying to polish your project past what anyone would notice. I forgot all those words but I still repeat to myself often “70% is close enough”

I hoped this helped you with creative burn out in some way. Please share it with your creative friends. You are talented and I love you.