Welcome to five-minute magic from Mindful Creative Podcast. A short bonus episode, sharing tips and insights from the book's pages of the same title. 
 
Every week I'll share one or two ideas that can give you an actionable takeaway for your creative process or work/business, or just the food for thought for the weekend ahead. 

These bonus episodes share content from the audio book, and you can find the link to the full version in the show notes.

Mindful Creative: How to understand and deal with the highs and lows of creative life, career and business

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[00:00:00] Welcome to five minute magic from the mindful creative podcast. A short bonus episode, share and tips and insights from the pages of the book of the same title. Every week I'll be sharing one or two ideas that can give you an actionable takeaway for your creative process, your work, your business. Or just food for thought for the weekend ahead. These episodes share content from the audio book, and you can find the link to the full version in the show notes below. 

Every creative knows the internal tug of war between seeking solitary inspiration and craving collaborative energy, with each path offering its own mix of freedom and frustration. The real battle, though, often lies within ourselves, as we navigate perfectionism, procrastination, and that nagging feeling of being an imposter, even when we rightfully earned our creative success.

Today, we have more previews from the second chapter, Mindful, Mindful. And it offers my favourite mantra, which is, I'm okay, I'm [00:01:00] enough, I belong. Facing creativity in isolation versus in a team. Creativity feeds on its surroundings and so the creative environment can have a big impact on the creative process. I'm not necessarily talking about Feng Shui. But I am talking about whether you're creating alone or collaboratively.

They're different approaches to the same thing, and they come with their own shortcuts and potential roadblocks. Some creatives like to work alone. They need that space, that freedom, that quiet, maybe even that level of control. Trying to generate and refine ideas in a room full of other people can be distracting and unnerving.

It can also be difficult to get your voice heard, and diplomacy can be the first thing to be thrown out of the window. But with creative solitude comes the potential of creative loneliness. [00:02:00] You might lack a network to bounce ideas up, or get feedback from, depending on the project you're working on. It may take longer, especially if you're committed to completing the auxiliary tasks around it yourself.

There's no one else around to help talk you through a creative block, and unhelpful thoughts can quickly multiply when you're alone, especially when you stray onto social media. I'm no good at this. Everyone else is better than me. The inverse is true of working in a creative team. There is the chance to get that vital spark from rubbing the bare twigs of ideas together.

The chance to make something greater than the sum of its parts. There is the opportunity to learn from each other and to develop our skills. There's also perhaps the greater chance of structure and a shared workload. But if egos sneak into the room, then there can be little space for other ideas to be heard.[00:03:00] 

Getting out of our own way. Whether we're creating alone or in a silent room with a dozen other people yelling, one of the biggest things that can derail our creative train of thought is ourselves. We do it so often, so naturally, and in so many ways that being able not to do it can seem as much of a superpower as being able to create in the first place.

We generally step on our creative toes when we're either not clear enough about our self imposed boundaries, Or, when we overzealously apply them. We might, for example, let our strong work ethic spill over into workaholism, overthink everything and end up getting nothing done, set or accept unrealistic deadlines and then rush work to meet them, plan things too vaguely or not at all, and then either miss deadlines, or have to rush work to meet them.

Let [00:04:00] perfectionism make us too hard on ourselves, hold us over accountable, and judge ourselves by unrealistic standards. The kind we would never dream of judging others by. Succumb to some good, old fashioned procrastination. When this happens, our superpowers can become liabilities and drag us off the precarious tightrope one way or the other.

And whether we fall into inaction or over action, we fall out of the present moment and lose focus on what matters most. Using our creativity to its best potential. The eternal imposter. One of the most frustrating ways we can often throw a spanner in our own works is the dreaded imposter syndrome. We might be totally confident in situations where many are unsure, but we might struggle to cope with situations that most people wouldn't bat an eyelid at.

And this can mess us up, especially when we think we're being judged [00:05:00] by others for it. We become terrified of being found out somehow. We feel like we don't belong. Imposter syndrome is by no means confined to the creative industries, or even the world of work. It can come as much from a social situation, as being placed in a role, or asked to do something that we feel is bigger than our skillset or knowledge.

It can be all consuming, and it can appear out of nowhere. But what is an imposter? It's someone who's pretending to be something that they're not. To a degree, everyone feels like this at some point. It's an inevitable part of life, especially when they're trying to fake it till we make it. It's important to remember here that there's a world of difference between genuinely being an imposter, let's take identity theft as an extreme example, and imposter syndrome, worrying that, in our case, you're not a good enough creative.

The latter has to do with [00:06:00] self doubt, the Achilles heel of untold numbers of creatives throughout history, and it can be challenged and gotten through. If you're in a good position and have a strong reputation, you've likely worked hard for it. It won't have magically appeared. You deserve to enjoy it, and you will benefit more from enjoying it than if you will by letting those darker voices eat away at you and draw you away from the moment.

Remember to remind yourself that you're doing okay, you are enough, and you definitely belong where you are.