By Leo Babauta
We’re almost at the beginning of the month, and that means you should be getting ready to start the Create Daily habit!
Here’s what you need to do, in a few easy steps:
- Read the brief plan for this habit.
- Pick a creative habit to start with.
- Pick a trigger … something you already do every morning, like brush your teeth, drink tea/coffee, wake up, open your computer/phone, shower, eat breakfast. If you don’t think you have anything you regularly do, keep a log of all your activities tomorrow morning, and see if there’s anything there you can use as a trigger. You’re going to focus on doing your Create Daily habit right after this trigger every morning.
- Write a note that says, “CREATE!” and put it where your trigger happens. The note might go next to your coffee maker or coffee cup (if the trigger is drinking coffee), next to your toothbrush, on your bathroom mirror, etc. This will ensure that you don’t forget.
Focus on Starting
For the first week, all you need to do is get started. Try to do 2 minutes of your creative habit each day, but the amount of time isn’t important. Just start. If you get started, you can count that as a success.
How do you get started? Clear away everything, think about why this is important to you, and write the first word. Draw the first line of your sketch. Anything to get moving.
You might use the idea of a friend of mine (Paul Foxton), who advises artists to form a simple habit: Just Open Your Sketchbook (JOYS). If you’re not sketching, you might Just Get Out Your Guitar (JGOYG) or Just Open a Blank Text Document (JOBTD) or Just Open Your Blog Editor (JOYBE). I admit those acronyms are not as catchy, though.
I also used to tell myself, when I was starting out with the running habit, Just Lace Up Your Shoes (JLUYS). I’ve never claimed to be good at acronyms.
Whatever acronym you choose, become a starter. You’ll love it.