Chris J Wilson

Today, we went to the countryside and cooked sausages over a fire. Not much around, very poor phone signal, and things were as they should be.

I didn’t have to think about work or what creative project I should do next. I could just enjoy hunting for firewood, sipping back a beer and playing a few games.

It’s moments like this that make me realize how shallow most of my rest is.

Instead of the deep, REM stuff where time passes without much notice and there’s no nagging feeling, there’s a shallow rest, where nothing is really settled, and there’s always a place to be or a project to do in the back of my mind.

In theory, this is exactly the sort of thing GTD and other systems are designed to aid: Working when you work and resting when you rest, safe in the knowledge that your trusted system has it covered. But in reality, many creative projects are never truly off.¹

It seems that rest, creativity and productivity are complicated (who knew!) and that a lot of one size fits all advice is probably bad.

When I was in my mid 20s, I was obsessed with productivity stuff. I thought I ought to spend every waking moment doing something productive.

Of course, that was silly. I wish I had know.

I spent so much time trying to learn “how to be productive” and while it brought fruit, after a while, the benefits were reduced, the points were much a like, and I still struggled with the same issues. It made me realize that those personality traits and habits were the biggest issues I had and I could focus all my attention on those.

I’m sure this isn’t the most productive approach – there are probably more areas I could be productive in – it works for me…for now. Who knows, maybe I’ll go deep into the productive rabbit hole again one day, or maybe I’ll just forget all about that.

I have no idea.

But today, I rested. And it was good.

Last week I had an impromptu task at work that is the kind of thing I love about my job. I was asked to make a video bumper for some tutorials we’re putting together. It’s the kind of creative task that is also a bit of a break from the day to day stuff.

I looked into the tools that came with my work PC, then some online services and eventually came back to the brilliant LumaFusion Pro on my iPhone.

As I thought about this moment after, I realised just how powerful the tools on smartphones (especially iOS) are. The camera can be used for picture or video, you can use the free pages to write an ebook (with videos), you can find logo making tools, play with GarageBand, record a quick song idea and basically make practically anything you want and then share it with millions of people. (Okay, perhaps just your friends).

If you want to create something, then a tool which most people have in their pocket and apps that are infinitely more affordable than they used to be are all around you.

With the blogvember challenge, its a great time to remember how incredibly lucky we are to be alive now. We have all the tools we need.

I just completed the inktober challenge yesterday and I’m about to embark upon the “blogvember” or “NaBloPoMo” (or whatever you choose to call it). I know I’m not alone in attempting this or similar challenges so I thought my first post should be about the challenge – meta, I know.

Be kind to yourself.

With challenges like this, or starting a new habit, it’s very easy to get into all or nothing mindsets: To think that we must do the best everyday.

When we inevitably fail, in some minor or major way, we beat ourselves up and condemn ourselves as worthless. “I’ll never be able to do it! I couldn’t even keep it up for three days.” So, we just stop and feel bad.

This is the wrong approach.

Spoiler; it doesn’t matter if you miss one day of a thirty day challenge. You’ve still done 29 days more. You can catch up later, or not. The point isn’t to do every day, it’s to do more.

James Clear in his book Atomic Habits advises the “rule of two”. Basically, don’t miss two occasions in a row. It’s a useful mindset to help a habit going. But I also like CGP Grey’s comment on Hello Internet where he talks about the meta skill of restarting a habit fast.

If you miss a day, identify why (I was driving on Wednesday evening when I would normally do my inktober sketch) and think of a way to get round it (for example, do my next sketch in the morning. Make note when I’m traveling this month and make sure I can find a different time instead).

And importantly, start again.

These challenges should be fun experiment not a guilt trip.

Be kind to yourself this November (and all the time).

About 10 years ago, I wanted to be a professional blogger. Now I’m happy to be an unprofessional blogger. Well, most of the time at least.

I thought I wanted the exciting lifestyle of making money from work anywhere I wanted. I saw these people “doing nothing” (spoiler, they were doing a lot more than what I saw) and thought that looked great. Free products to review, working in my pyjamas, travel whenever I wanted.

But pursuing that “dream” did something to me.

When I sought to be a professional blogger, I ended up focusing on tactics and topics which didn’t really interest me. I focused on topics that would help my search engine position with 800+ word articles for topics that could be addressed in 350 words at most.

It wasn’t all bad; it made me a better writer and led to my current career. In many ways, my day job is being a professional blogger. But I don’t need to pursue page views for personal projects anymore.

As an unprofessional blogger, I can

• write about what I want, when I want
• not write when I don’t want to (and not apologize!)
• try out something stupid and fail (but have fun)
• make grammar and spelling mistakes (and thank kind souls who point them out while deliberately annoying pretentious pedants)
• make a mess of my website as I change the design

Basically, I can have fun.

Of course, there are times when the green-eyed monster appears after someone else has great success for something which “I could do better” (In most cases I probably couldn’t and in the cases where I might be able to, the fact of the matter is that I’m not doing it and they are. That’s all that matters). It’s something that will probably remain, but I’ll try to stay grateful that I’m an unprofessional blogger.

My Daughter doesn’t need this advice. She’s just turned 14 months old and she is the most curious person I know.

Sometimes I don’t like her curiosity and try to stifle it. Like when she picks up a cigarette bud off the ground and moves it towards her mouth. Or when she tries to touch the dark black surface of our induction hob that is still radiating heat.

While those occasions may be very noble efforts, there are other occasions where the intention and outcome are less positive. When I’m tried and just want to sit on the sofa and not check every room in the house. Or when she hears a noise on a walk and wants to go back towards it while I want to rush on to our already late appointment.

Of course, her curiosity is not unusual for a kid: they all are curious. But that also means she’s likely to lose this trait. Especially if her father discourages her.

So this advice is for myself. Stay curious, encourage your daughter’s curiosity. You never know where it might take you.

I’ve been “sketchnoting” for about four years now, but I spent a lot longer wishing I could sketchnote. That’s why I created 7 days to start sketchnoting, so people wouldn’t waste time wishing they could sketchnote, but start immediately.

I can’t remember the first sketchnote I saw, it was probably on twitter back when it wasn’t a cool place. As soon as I saw it I wanted to make something similar but two things help me back

• “I can’t draw”
• how the hell do you organise information so well! So I carried on with my notes plus a could of visual ideas. It wasn’t until I decided that it could really improve my teaching and my students learning that I properly dived into sketchnoting.

Guess what.

It wasn’t as difficult as I had built it up in my head. All it took was a couple of key insights and I broke through the barriers that held me back. I applied those ideas to the way I introduced sketchnotes to students and saw a massive increase in the number of students who started sketchnoting as a result.

So I’m sharing what I learned in the 7 days to start sketchnoting course.

It’s completely free and a self study course. You can start today (and finish every activity today) or take a couple of months to go through it all. But, if you want an assignment a day for a week, then you can get email prompts for just that.

So sign up and get started sketchnoting today.

This year I’ve seen some writers and podcasters whom I like and have followed for a while make some (interesting/bad/not-for-me) decisions. Today I saw one example and thought this person needs more of what Austin Kleon calls “eyerollers”: a person who will tell great people they are being dumb.

One example I’ve seen is people taking themselves too seriously. They’ve reached a level of success and now every new thing they are doing is a HUGE deal.

Another is employing the tactics that everyone else is using (when they achieved their initial success because they didn’t use those same tactics).

Both of these types of people (and myself) could use some eyerollers in their lives. (But hey, if you roll your eye, you’re just a hater).

I think it was Valerie Jardin who twisted the classic saying to

the best camera is the one you take more pictures with.

While this can certainly be “the one you have with you” (including a smart phone) it may also be a big bulky, dedicated camera if it encourages you to take more photos than your phone.

I believe this is a good rule of thumb for most tools. We want tools that make us use them more. With apps for sketchnoting, some people find the powerful procreate encourages them to sketch more. Other people find the most limited paper by wetransfer gives them the creative constraints they need to draw without thinking too much. (And some people use pen and paper).

The exceptions

There are, however, exceptions to this rule. Occasions when I want to do something less often or spend less time on an activity. I like this idea, but don’t often stick to it. Take email for example. I want to spend less time in my app and check it less often. I usually remove it from my phone to help deal with that (and then reinstall when I need to access some emails, and typically forget to uninstall for a month or two). In this situation, I want to use “the best” tool as it’s such a horrible experience. But perhaps that just encourages me to use it more. Maybe if I used an application I liked less, I’d develop better habits.

Curating friction

Basically, this is another attempt to curate friction, but in a different form. I’m still experimenting and attempting to use some worse/default apps/tools for tasks which I want to avoid doing. I’ll report back.

Do you do anything similar?

About a month ago I finally tested out an idea I had been wondering about. I registered a new account on Microblog with the username Ukulele. Today, I paid for the first months hosting.

I had wanted to do it sooner, but there had been a couple of things that held me back (funds in my bank account, not having my ukulele around while I traveled) but now it is live.

Why Ukulele MB

I did something similar in the past on Tumblr (and in fact had a lot of followers there). It was a way for me to share what I was learning and help me see my progress on the instrument. Recently, I’ve been playing the ukulele more again and introducing my 1 year old daughter to the instrument (she’s moved from hitting the strings to kind of sort of plucking them). With my appreciation of Micro.blog, I realised it could be a great new combination. A way to share fun images, and video/audio of me playing. Plus maybe I’ll find some other Ukulele players on MB and share their stuff (with their permission of course).

Follow and get connected with Ukulele MB

I’d like your help. Please let me know what type of content you’d like to see (especially if you are a ukulele player yourself) and follow the @ukulele account

I’ve found it harder to write “title worthy” posts recently. I’m not sure the exact origin of this trend.

• Perhaps I’m concentrating more on other creative activities that drain that inspirational spark.
• Maybe I’m being drained more by work with a more strenuous workload.
• Possibly my inspirational diet isn’t as rich as it has been in the past.
• or it might just be a little creative burnout. Whatever it is, I’m still going through the creative motions–Learning and getting inspired, doing some common creative activities, sharing items that inspire me. These habits have helped me not worry about the lack of titled posts. After all. I’m still creating–I have many sketchnotes which aren’t for others to see–and I know that the drought will end at some point. Yes, this is a post about writing: A thing I usually hate. In my opinion, it’s much better to create primary source material than commentary on top of commentary. But it’s not criminal to occasionally discuss the frustrations of creating and you can do whatever you want with your blog.

Sidenote, I’m not talking about writers block. I’ve been writing, just none of it was worth sharing on my site.

Newton’s third law of physics states “For every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction.” It’s true of the creative process too.

I’ve noticed a tension present in most creative work. The ideas and projects which are the most exciting and motivating also have the most inertia.

The cause of that drag can be laziness, distractions and self-doubt.

That tension doesn’t feel pleasant, but it’s a telltale sign that a project is a good idea.

In my experience, your stock is best made by collecting, organising and expanding upon your flow. Social media sites function a lot like public notebooks …but the thing about keeping notebooks is that you have to revisit them in order to make the most out of them… once you make sharing part of your daily routine, you’ll notice themes and trends emerge in what you share. You’ll find patterns in your flow.

• Show Your Work by Austin Kleon

I like Austin’s approach to stock and flow media. Flow is like the little ideas we chuck out and see how it feels when they’re published.

Maybe nothing happens. Maybe something sticks.

There might be an opportunity to expand upon this idea and turn it into stock or it may inspire more flow.

Related, I saw this LinkedIn post from Gary Vaynerchuk (I’ve probably lost some people already but it is worth watching what he is doing) which at first looks like he has the opposite model – He starts with long content (a podcast or vlog?) and then turns it into smaller content. But he is actually doing the same.

His longer content is flow, just ideas from meetings. Then it is refined into more solid content and ideas by his team.

When I was a kid, I struggled a lot with drawing. I’d try to draw a round circle. Put pencil to paper and before I rounded the first corner, I’d know it was no good.

So I’d rub it out and start again. This time the first corner would be good but it would be more oval. And so I’d picked up the eraser again, and again and again.

Soon I’d have a pile of eraser rubbings on the side and even though I had removed all the graphite from the page, a mess of a circle would remain due to the indentation. Frustrated I’d give up or try something else.

I couldn’t accept the reality of my skills not matching the vision in my mind.

I accepted that I was no artists.

Imperfections are okay

I still wish I could draw a perfect circle, or a straight line that doesn’t go up at the end. Maybe one marvelous day I’ll look down with surprise at one of these impossibilities emerging, but I don’t need it to happen anymore. I’m better at accepting these quirks and trying to turn them into something unique.

When the line bends the wrong way, maybe I can use that for something else. When the circle is more squashed in one direction, perhaps the person’s face was always meant to be that odd shape.

This is a lot easier with pen an paper than iPad and pencil™️, The ease of the double tap undo gesture is seductive and less noticeable than the collection of discarded shavings. That’s why I’ve embraces analogue sketching tools more recently (along with the increased screen time from my job).

Keep drawing circles

I still keep drawing circles, and still can’t really get one “right”. But now I leave the previous attempts. These accidents sometimes lead to and idea that couldn’t exist.

I’ve recently become aware of how powerful listening is and how terrible I am at it. It’s shocking the number of times when I ”listen” but am really just waiting to speak.

When I have truly listened and held back from speaking or giving my 2c, the conversation is always more edifying and usually saves time as I don’t say something the other person would have said anyway.

I’m starting to think that developing my listening skills may be one of the most transformative actions I can take.

One of the curious ideas I found in Atomic Habits is that often our environments have a greater impact on us than motivation or character.

For example, if you live in a country where there’s lots of cheap fast food, you’re more likely to be overweight than in a country where fast food is expensive and most people have more restricted diets.

There are exceptions, but you will be closes to your countries average (whatever that is).

But this isn’t just on the macro countrywide level, it equally applies to our micro environments such as the office and home. If your shelves are stocked with sweets and chocolate, then you probably won’t eat as healthy as when they are full with fruits and vegetables.

This is where curating friction comes in.

Friction is how easy or difficult an action is. If it’s easy to complete, it’s a low-friction activity. If it’s difficult to complete, then it’s a high-friction activity.

When we curate friction, we are adding or removing friction in areas of our lives to make certain actions easier or more difficult. Here’s some practical examples.

• Placing a paper notebook journal open to today’s date on your bedside table is reducing the friction to journal.
• Packing your games console away after you play increases the friction of playing a “quick” game.
• Placing your scale at the end of the bed is a great way to reduce the friction of regularly weighing yourself.
• Uninstalling all the social media apps on your phone is increasing the friction to get stuck scrolling the endless feed.

There are many more examples for different habits and goals and in each case it’s not impossible to do the “wrong” thing. But it’s much more difficult and becomes easier to choose the right thing.

The idea of curating friction as it helps me take more ownership of my environments. Just as an art gallery makes decisions about every item on display include where it is positioned in relationship to the other pieces, so should I take ownership of the friction I create and leave in my life.

I’d love to know what ways you currently curate friction in your life.