I recently came across this phrase and think it can widely be applied to our habits both at work and personally. When we are comfortable in our jobs and our relationships we end up going through the motions; once short cuts are established we stop questioning the process and stop challenging the status quo. We end up starving the parts of our brain that fuel creativity. It’s just quicker and easier that way. But we then resent the rut we end up in.
It’s like we are putting ourselves on factory settings which means we, and by extension our teams churn out the same ideas that are easy enough to execute and won’t ruffle feathers or cause anyone too much stress. We cut and paste presentations, personalise a couple of slides of a deck and can present it half asleep. When I was a photo director at a weekly magazine, we were constantly on deadline and the creativity got sucked out of the process just to get to print. It’s the Charlie Brown teacher effect. Wa Wa Wa Wa Wa WAAAAAAAAAAAA.
We funnel excitement and ideas when we are pitching for a new client, but once they are secure and we know what they like, we stop worrying about them as long as they aren’t complaining. It makes sense, your motivation to shake things up and propose a risky campaign is almost non existent unless they put the account back out to tender. Whereas when you are trying to win new business the ideas can be radical and controversial because their money hasn’t already been counted.
But we forget to feed our brains and nourish our personal and creative selves and to remind ourselves what we are capable of. I’ve written a lot about capitalising on the opportunity that the pandemic presented me to quit drinking. My friend Gina says that the main reset I gave my brain is that I reminded myself that I had agency. Once I quit booze, running and losing seven stone wasn’t that scary as I had already conquered my biggest dragon. It is worth taking on projects personally or at work that kick our arses. Things that scare us, things we might fail at; but things that remind us that we are creative beasts to be reckoned with. Remind yourself of your worth.
Prior to the weekend of the Sarah Everard vigil I had never been on camera or on the radio. It was trial by fire and I found out that I love live interviews (partially as I don’t have to see them later or worry about what I forgot to say) and now I’ve done over 300. Don’t think about all of the ways it could go wrong, think about how much impact you could potentially have if you took the leap, if you asked the question, if you pitched the idea.
Dr. Charlotte Proudman asked me to be on a panel a few years ago; and I said yes without asking who else was on it. And then it was me, Jess Phillips and Nazir Afzal. I was freaking out that I didn’t belong with that calibre of other panellists. But not only did I belong; it compelled me to propose myself for more paid speaker opportunities. We get in the way of our own success with self doubt and imposter syndrome rather than treating challenging opportunities as brain food.
To prep for that panel I read Nazir’s amazing book The Prosecutor and a ton of policy papers on police inflicted Domestic Violence. Instead of feeding my fear and insecurity, I fed my motivation.
A friend was just questioning if ice baths really have restorative effects on mental health or if it is all BS. And I believe that it is motivational nourishment and determinism. Committing to anything that you think makes you have a better day automatically makes you have a better day because you are aiming to do so and focussing on it.
I’m in a new role as Director of Business Development for Tomorrow Group and learning tons about performance marketing, data science and generative AI. All of the experiential marketing I’ve ever done was based on reading the market and watching trends, but not hard data that has immediate and demonstrable ROI. I feel like I have won the golden ticket having the hard search data and being able to share all of the ways to capitalise on interest and events. I can prove the worth of my work. Actually show it.
It’s been years since I went deep into the rabbit hole on a speciality subject and I am loving it. Spending a Saturday night looking at generative AI and custom ChatGPT reminds me of being in Uni and it makes me hungry to learn more. The moment when I realised how I can share my new learnings with clients that are also not techy, that’s magic. And expertise in summarising and boiling the topics down to soundbites was directly influenced by learning how to do it on radio and tv for my campaigning work. Because I jumped in the deep end and realised I could swim.
That is nourishment for my motivation. And we need it. We need it to invigorate our brains and approaches and to rid ourselves of Sunday scaries and getting in ruts. Ruts suck. They make us interview for roles we don’t really want because we are bored. A bored me is a destructive me.
So shake it up. Shake up your routines. Question why you do the things that you have always done. Embrace how AI can add efficiencies to your jobs so that you can use your nourished brain to focus on the creative work that no computer will ever replicate. Create a little earthquake at home and at work.
Use different recipes or only use an air fryer. Cook a different cuisine. Run a different route or do hill training. Read translated books. Take different routes. Tear up the rule books and try to enjoy yourself in the process. Remind yourself what you are capable of.
Nourish your motivation and reap the benefits.
(And if you see me in real life, expect me to talk your ear off about digital marketing and data, I am activated. )