✏️ Creative Routines
Designing a creative way to start your day
📖 The Quote
‘I don’t need anything to pass the time; I need a project. (…) that gives me energy.’ — David Hockney, A Bigger Message
✏️ The Sketch(es)
Try the following framework to design a creative way to start your day:
Analysis
Take a piece of paper and write down a detailed list of what you do every morning. You will then have a good overview of the way you start your days.
It could go like this:
7.00 - Alarm goes off
7.27 - Get up after snoozing
7.30 - Prepare coffee
7.40 - Writing / Reading
8.30 - Get ready to work (shower, etc.)
9.00 - Start work
Focus on the weekdays first and perhaps later re-do this exercise for the weekends to assess the differences.
Do you spend time doing something creative every morning?
In my example, I invest1 about an hour every morning on doing something that improves my creativity (writing and reading).
Vision
Envision what you’d like your morning to be and which creative routine you’d like to incorporate into it.
Be imaginative: draw, design your morning! Use the medium you find yourself more comfortable with to depict your dreamy morning: sketching, writing, collage...
The key is to visualise it.
Creative routines are different for each of us. Some examples: drawing what you see when you wake up, writing morning pages, reading a book, inspiration walks around the park (or the mountain), photographing the same subject, journaling, baking...
But don’t be too ambitious - choose the one creative routine you’d like to take as a habit and focus on getting that one working consistently (the rest will follow).
Going back to my example, I’d like to start my days more actively (moving my body boosts my creativity). At the same time, I am craving to start a new seasonal project: there’s these fantastic gigantic trees in the park close to mine that look so beautiful in the early Autumn morning. A walk around the park to capture them daily will be a win-win.
Design
Go back and assess that first list.
What’s missing, what’s not working, and what actions do you have to take in order to live that vision? How much time can you dedicate and what do you need to do to stick with this new creative habit?
Write all this down and update that list to incorporate this new habit. Focus on that one creative routine and sketch different options depending on the time you can or want to dedicate to it. Stick with the option that seems the easiest to carry on.
In my case, I have identified the need to stop snoozing and getting up earlier to gain an extra half an hour so I can walk around the park and photograph the changing season.
The new schedule will look like this:
7.00 - Alarm goes off
7.09 - Get up after snoozing only once
7.10 - Prepare coffee
7.15 - Writing / Reading
8.00 - Get ready to work
8.30 - Walk around the park / photography project
9.00 - Start work
Iteration
Put your vision into practice and get back to the schedule regularly to make adjustments.
Constantly review your routine to make it even easier to perform. We are not after a single great creative morning, we are looking for a consistent habit that compounds over time.
I’ll try different options for my new routine, for example: getting up and packing up the coffee to drink it while walking, separating writing and reading sessions before and after the walk, or doing both after.
Resilience
Be flexible with your own time.
Adjust the morning routine to your needs, don’t be rigid with it. Skip it sometimes - miss it. Break it and start from scratch if you feel it’s not working. Try a completely different creative habit if that first one didn’t stick.
This morning routine only works for me when I am working from home. Once or twice a week I will have to break it. - But that is okay.
💡 Some Thoughts
Every artist can benefit from a daily, consistent morning creative routine.
Some years ago, I realised that my morning routine was essential to the core of my artistic and creative practice. That time is sacred. And consistency is the secret. Instead of getting up and rolling myself into another busy day, I make the effort to protect this time to do something creative.
You can create any habit at any time of the day, but focusing on the mornings, even if you don’t have too much time to spend, will set up a more creative mindset to start your day, every day. This space - The Sketch Club - wouldn’t exist if it wasn’t because I make room in my mornings for these creative routines.
Repetition and iteration are excellent creative tools. Habits have the power to compound over time.
Before the Pandemic in 2020, my creative routine consisted of taking photos of King’s Cross Station during my daily morning commute. Although this happened spontaneously, I soon noticed the benefits and made it a conscious habit. I stuck to it for over a year (it finished with the beginning of the lockdown and working from home).
The result of repeating and iterating this morning habit in a nutshell: I learned a lot about photography (I have more than 400 pictures of the same subject), and what’s much more important, it transformed a dreadful commute to work across busy London into an enjoyable, pleasant one - I was excited to jump into the front row of the double-decker bus every single morning2.
For those of us who used to love to go to school, September feels like a New Year, and a great opportunity to re-design our creative routines.
The start of the new season after the holidays is the perfect moment to evaluate one’s creative practices, revisit old habits, and re-design new ones. I strongly recommend following the principles in James Clear’s book ‘Atomic Habits’ on creating a good sticking habit (this is the way I planned my new morning walk around the park):
Make it obvious
Make it attractive
Make it easy
Make it satisfying
Be disciplined but not rigid: creative routines need to be flexible to adapt and stick in the long term.
Keep a routine but be relaxed about breaking it, or adapting it. If it doesn’t stick it’s because something isn’t right. Try something else. Something will click and you will stick to it. Focus on one important, relevant creative habit and the rest will follow. Consistency is what we are after. If you try to be too ambitious and squeeze in too many habits you’ll fail. It won’t be easy nor satisfying.
Discipline and planning don’t come naturally to everyone. My trick to overcome the resistance is to plan at different scales to be able to improvise within the plans (truth is, this is also my approach to design in general).
I set up a consistent framework that builds my routine so that I can improvise within these lines and be flexible to adjust things. For example, I would give myself blocks of creative time (1 hour in the morning) and a cue to trigger the task (prepare coffee) and to finish it (get ready to work). What happens between those boundaries adapts to my daily needs and mood, but I am always consistent in doing something creative during that hour.
📚 Recommended Readings
These are a few good references and resources I have read and would recommend on the topic of routines, rituals, and habits:
‘Atomic Habits’ by James Clear. This is the bible of habit creation.
‘The Artist’s Way’ by Julia Cameron, and in particular, her views on Morning Pages and other creative tools, which I wrote about in this previous post.
‘Rooms of Their Own’ by Alex Johnson. This is an inspiring book on the creative routines and spaces of some celebrated writers. I also wrote a post about it (link here).
Happy sketching! ✏️✨
Ana
Do you have a creative (morning) routine? It would be great to hear about it! Please, leave a comment and share your thoughts :)
It truly is an investment to spend time on yourself.
I promise to write a post and show you more about this fascinating project I called ‘A Year of King’s Cross Station’.
Thanks a lot for the reminder, Ana! I’m a big fan of morning routines before rushing to work, but still find it difficult to stick to them. I’ve recently found that to keep and develop my morning routines I have first to work on my routines before going to sleep, as they determine how will I wake up the following day. Any tips about how to be consistent with the habit?
For me my morning routine is a must to make sure I take care of my own creative, mental, and physical health before the kids wake up and the work day begins. I’m also reading The Artist’s Way at Work and am looking to add an Artist Date to my weekly routine to help me fill up my well. Thanks for the reminder! 😀