Hi, I’m Jeremy, I’m glad you’re here.
No matter what you create, I’m guessing you spend a good amount of time feeling lost, hopeless, and unsure about how to get from where you are to where you want to be.
So do I. And so does everyone doing creative work.
This is the Creative Wilderness.
Every week, I publish a new article in my Creative Wayfinding newsletter about how we as creators and marketers can navigate it with more clarity and confidence.
If you’re building something that matters, but aren’t quite sure how to take the next step forward, I’d be honoured to have you join us.
Subscribe
Latest Post
Creative Synthesis: Decoding the Process of Idea Generation
Photosynthesis might be the closest thing to alchemy that exists.
I mean, when you really stop to think about it, the fact that trees can turn sunlight into wood with the help of carbon dioxide is nothing short of utterly alien and wildly fantastic.
But perhaps even more confounding is that this alchemy is far from rare.
More than 82% of the world’s biomass is made up of plants, each photosynthesizing in one way or another.
Beyond plants, fungi, bacteria, viruses, and every variety of animal species each use their own form of synthesis to grow and propagate.
Including us.
Our bodies reliably turn everything from leafy greens and root vegetables, to hamburgers, Pringles, and Twinkies into the blood, flesh, bone, and brain that enable us to live the vast variety of lives we lead.
Utterly magical.
And entirely ubiquitous.
Synthesis, it seems, is the default operating system for life.
It should come as no surprise then, that it’s the same process that governs the idea generation which powers our creative work, turning the raw material we consume into something unrecognizable.
And yet, most of us seem to have a better understanding of the photosynthesis performed by trees than the synthesis we rely on for our work.
While we might have some idea of our desired outputs, we rarely have a clear sense of what the inputs are.
The reasons, I think, are twofold.
- Similar to trees requiring carbon dioxide and sunlight to make wood, the inputs we require to create our desired outputs are rarely obvious or directly related.
- Even to produce similar outputs, each of us requires our own set of unique inputs.
To unlock our personal creative potential, then, one of the primary cruxes we need to solve is identifying the raw materials that we can most efficiently synthesize into our creative outputs.
Then, we need to trust that those (often obscure) inputs will lead to our desired results.
Personally, the raw materials I synthesize most efficiently into my writing and creative work are things like walking, views of the horizon, vistas, and trees, new places, and practicing different methods of transportation and navigation.
They also include consuming content on the natural world, adventures, storytelling, and fiction.
Despite knowing that these are the raw materials that power my creative synthesis, I’m not immune from the pull of more conventional content.
I constantly feel like I should be reading more business books, listening to more marketing podcasts, studying the same creators, and following the same guides everyone else seems to be obsessing over.
I regularly give in to this temptation.
But when I observe my most creative periods and the things I was doing that led to them, it’s clear that my best, most inspired, original work comes when I disconnect from those more obvious inputs.
To be fair, I’ve already consumed thousands of hours of that content, and at this point, the improvements of consuming more of it are likely to be incremental at best.
There’s certainly something to be learned from studying the mechanics, frameworks, and strategies.
But those aren’t the things that give your work heart or resonance or connection with others.
They’re merely the vehicles of delivery.
And if you’ve got nothing to deliver, the vehicle isn’t much use.
If you want to create work that moves people, and moves the needle for your business, start with identifying the raw materials that synthesize into your best, most resonant, most original work.
Surround yourself with them.
Then, let the alchemy begin.
Explore how to navigate a creative life that matters
This article originally appeared in my weekly Creative Wayfinding Newsletter. Each issue is the product of a week of work, and contains something not available for sale.
A fresh perspective, a shot of encouragement when you need it most, and maybe even some genuine wisdom from time to time.
Each week, we explore a different facet of the question “How do we navigate the wilds of creating work that matters?”
It’s something I’m proud to create and I’d be honoured to share it with you.
Subscribe
More Posts
Creative Conditioning
It’s not uncommon for elite athletes to travel to high-altitude locations to train.
The idea is that if they’re able to train their bodies to perform in a difficult, low-oxygen environment, where the conditions for peak performance are not ideal, they’ll be able to perform even better during competition when the conditions are ideal.
There’s a lot we as creators can take away from this practice.
Too often we defer on creating until the conditions are right.
When we have the right tools.
When we’re in the right environment.
When we have something clear to say.
When inspiration strikes.
Much like the fairweather athlete, these are the requirements of amateurs.
If we want to live up to our potential with our work, we need to master the habit and the skill of creating when the conditions are not ideal.
As with truly elite athletes, the best way to achieve this is to actively seek out these less-than-perfect conditions and get good at creating in spite of them.
We can deprive ourselves of the best tools, or even seek out the clumsiest tools possilble.
We can seek out environments full of distraction, discomfort, and annoyance.
We can sit down to work when we’re uninspired and feeling like we have nothing worthwhile to share.
No, the work we produce with these limitations might not great.
It might not even be good.
But be If we train our creative muscles in the most difficult environments possible, we can break down the self-imposed requirements for creating.
More often than not, these are simply a place to hide after all.
Then, when the conditions are right, we’ll find ourselves primed to make the absolute most of them.
Wrong Type of Door
We often approach our creative work as if the impact and success we seek is behind a motion-activated door.
That if we show up within sight of our target, the doors will simply slide open and we’ll be ushered in.
When the doors fail to open, we wave our arms around for a while before shrugging our shoulders and moving onto the next door, hoping we’ll have better luck with that one.
Maybe the sensor is miscalibrated, we might think, or even rigged against the little guys like us.
It turns out, however, that it’s not the sensor that’s miscalibrated, it’s our expectations.
The sensor doesn’t even exist, in fact.
If we looked closer, we would see that the door has a keyhole.
What’s more, there’s a ring of keys lying on the ground in front of it.
Sure, there are dozens of keys, but one of them will open the door.
When we understand this, it’s clear that more than innate talent, inspiration, or luck, all we need is enough patience to work our way through each of the keys until we find the one that fits.
Dispel Preciousness
There’s a phase at the start of every expedition where even the seasoned traveler does everything within their power to keep their hands clean, their feet dry, and their knees unscraped.
Compare that with the creature that emerges after a week in the wilderness, sloshing through rivers, crawling on hands and knees through thickets, and pulling themselves up steep slopes by muddy roots, and you’d be forgiven for thinking they were entirely different species, let alone people.
It’s only natural to maintain a level of preciousness about our comport and appearance when we start out on any project.
But make no mistake.
What serves us in civilized society is of no use in the wild lands where we discover and create our best work.
Better to dispel our preciousness early and get on with the work we came to do, using all the tools at our disposal, scrambling our way forward, and finding creative ways around the obstacles in our path.
Shed the hope of keeping clean and unscarred.
That life is but a memory now.
Bury your hands in the soil.
Soak your feet in icy streams.
And discover the freedom that comes from embodying your full potential,
Uninhibited. Unencumbered. Unafraid.
The Big Secret
The big secret is that no one knows anything.
That no one knows for sure that this will work and that won’t.
That even the most accomplished among us are still shooting in the dark with each new endeavor.
That the only proven path to success is to simply keep creating until you land on something that resonates.
That rather than exceptional talent, what’s required to create that work is exceptional consistency and commitment to your craft.
That the the best help you can find is not someone who’ll teach you the newest marketing hack,
But someone who can hold you accountable to your practice.
That each new idea is nothing more than a lottery ticket.
And that the only way to improve your odds of winning is to keep buying new tickets.
Eliminate Excuses
I would but…
I don’t have the time.
I don’t have the right tools.
I don’t know the right people.
I don’t have any ideas.
I’m not talented enough.
I don’t have the budget.
I don’t know enough.
I’m scared.
We all have a long list of excuses we call on to keep us from putting ourselves on the hook and creating something that matters.
More often than not, however, those excuses are simply a place to hide.
A way for us to avoid the real reason we’re holding back from sharing our insight, perspective, and voice with the world.
Fear.
We all have that too.
To get past the fear requires us to see it for what it is.
To get there, we need to first eliminate our excuses, one by one, crossing them off our list until we get to the root of our discomfort.
I’m scared…
Of what my friends will think.
Of what my family will think.
Of what my Facebook friends from high school will think.
Of losing steam.
Of falling flat.
Of failing.
And of seeing it through.
Of the attention.
Of the scrutiny.
Of the feedback.
Of the criticism.
Or worse, the ambivalence.
We can’t eliminate the fear.
But we can look it in the face and choose to create in spite of it.
It’s the only way anyone has ever created something that changed things, in ways big or small.
And if you seek to do the same, it’s the only path to get there.
Logging Miles vs. Making Progress
It’s easy to think they’re one and the same.
In reality, our mileage count rarely squares with the progress we’ve made toward our goal.
We spend most of our time running in circles–or in place.
We make small bits of forward progress only during rare flashes of bravery, inspiration, or motivation. Or perhaps when compelled to by deadlines and other external forces.
Otherwise, we pace.
Back and forth.
Round and round.
Out of fear of failure.
Out of avoidance of discomfort.
Out of what we tell ourselves is a lack of clarity.
We rack up the miles, convincing ourselves with each uptick in the odometer that we’re getting closer to our destination.
The problem is that walking around our neighborhood is safe. Known. Navigable.
We know the potholes to avoid. The speed traps. The nearest convenience store.
Out beyond the freeway where the tarmac turns to gravel and the streetlights run out, there are no such comforts.
And yet we know, deep down, that that’s the only road that leads where we’re seeking to go.
We know it’s going to be a bumpy road.
We know we’re going to get lost at least once or twice.
We know it will test our resolve.
But we know our destination is at the other end.
And no amount of miles spent stalking the streets of our neighborhood is going to move us any closer.
What Do You Want To Be Known For?
It’s a question worth asking yourself.
Too often, however, we skip it and let our reputations write themselves.
Rarely, we end up with a reputation equal to or better than we deserve.
More often, we end up with one that sells us and our work short.
Most often, however, when we let others write our reputation, it ends up fractured.
While we may be known for delivering solid work, beyond that, each of our clients, customers, and audience members has a different story to tell about what we’re uniquely positioned to bring to the world.
Of course, being known for delivering solid work isn’t a bad thing.
But most people deliver equally solid work and have the reputations to match.
Without a clear, consistent, unified message beyond that, it’s hard to stand out in a crowded market.
When you have a clear view of what we want to be known for, you give yourself a roadmap and a measuring stick to help you get there.
Whether it’s the quality of your work, customer service, communication, ease of use, or any other metric imaginable, having a clear idea of what you want people to say about you helps you craft an experience of your brand that encourages that narrative.
Just remember you can’t be known for everything.
Pick the one trait you want associated with your name and create a list of actions that will help you establish that reputation.
Then, spend more time pursuing those actions, making your vision a reality, until it’s so obviously tied to your brand experience that it can’t be ignored.
Then, watch as your clients, customers, and audience begin to do your marketing for you, with a unified message about why you truly are the best in the world at what you do.
Better Problems
Progress is often measured not by eliminating all your problems but by working yourself out of one problem and into another one.
If you’re lucky, the new problem will be a better problem than the one you just solved.
More fun. More rewarding. More interesting. More impactful.
Maybe even more challenging, if you have a masochistic streak.
Life without problems is a dreamy ideal, but it’s unlikely to actually materialize.
Pursue it as your guide if it helps.
Otherwise, just keep trying to work your way forward into better problems than the ones you solve.
Don’t Get Ahead of Yourself
Your default reaction to a new idea is to jump right in.
To get to work on the fun stuff, immediately start building, without first laying the groundwork.
Without deciding who and what the idea is even for.
Chances are, it’s not just about you.
Maybe it’s not about you at all.
Which means there’s work to do.
Research, conversations, patience, thought.
It’s true, the groundwork can sap the excitement from the project.
It feels as though you’re wasting precious time.
That if you don’t strike immediately, the opportunity will be wasted.
But if your idea, and your interest in it is so fragile that it can’t withstand some probing, questioning, and background research, it probably wasn’t worth much in the first place.
When it comes to the big ideas, however, the ideas with real potential, completing the groundwork only increases your excitement and commitment to the project.
When you find that there’s genuine market fit and audience interest in addition to your own enthusiasm.
These (and perhaps only these) are the ideas worth chasing.
Claw Back What’s Yours
Your time.
Your creativity.
Your inspiration.
God, sometimes even your hope,
Your faith in humanity
Your belief in yourself.
The world will twist and bend and monopolize every part of you if you let it.
So don’t.
Fight and kick and bite and tear and claw it back.
It’s your inheritance after all.
Your birthright.
Yours to use to bend the world to your will.
Take what’s yours and yours alone.
And don’t let the fight to reclaim it be in vain.
Creative Wayfinding For Ambitious Optimists.
Pull the Thread
The clue to your next step is almost always in front of you already.
The tiniest, shimmering thread of an idea,
Waiting for the light to catch it just right and attract your gaze.
When it does, you realize that you’ve looked past it, around it, over it, and straight through it a hundred times before.
But you’ve never really seen it.
At least not for what it is.
Once glimpsed, however, it becomes impossible to ignore.
Somehow, it both compels and cows you.
Who’s to say where it will lead, after all.
It could be the ticket to your next big breakthrough.
Or…
It could unravel everything you’ve built with the slightest tug.
Making you realize that what you mistook for solid ground beneath you
Was little more than cloud, bound tightly by hope and ignorance and belief.
Unspool as they might, the world you’ve constructed for yourself,
Followed far enough, these threads always lead back to something solid.
Rock bottom, bedrock, mountaintop?
It matters not.
A foundation to build from,
Or an anchor to pull towards.
Anything worth building requires a solid reference.
The threads leading the way are already in front of you
If you’re brave enough to pull.
Creative Conditioning
It’s not uncommon for elite athletes to travel to high-altitude locations to train.
The idea is that if they’re able to train their bodies to perform in a difficult, low-oxygen environment, where the conditions for peak performance are not ideal, they’ll be able to perform even better during competition when the conditions are ideal.
There’s a lot we as creators can take away from this practice.
Too often we defer on creating until the conditions are right.
When we have the right tools.
When we’re in the right environment.
When we have something clear to say.
When inspiration strikes.
Much like the fairweather athlete, these are the requirements of amateurs.
If we want to live up to our potential with our work, we need to master the habit and the skill of creating when the conditions are not ideal.
As with truly elite athletes, the best way to achieve this is to actively seek out these less-than-perfect conditions and get good at creating in spite of them.
We can deprive ourselves of the best tools, or even seek out the clumsiest tools possilble.
We can seek out environments full of distraction, discomfort, and annoyance.
We can sit down to work when we’re uninspired and feeling like we have nothing worthwhile to share.
No, the work we produce with these limitations might not great.
It might not even be good.
But be If we train our creative muscles in the most difficult environments possible, we can break down the self-imposed requirements for creating.
More often than not, these are simply a place to hide after all.
Then, when the conditions are right, we’ll find ourselves primed to make the absolute most of them.
Wrong Type of Door
We often approach our creative work as if the impact and success we seek is behind a motion-activated door.
That if we show up within sight of our target, the doors will simply slide open and we’ll be ushered in.
When the doors fail to open, we wave our arms around for a while before shrugging our shoulders and moving onto the next door, hoping we’ll have better luck with that one.
Maybe the sensor is miscalibrated, we might think, or even rigged against the little guys like us.
It turns out, however, that it’s not the sensor that’s miscalibrated, it’s our expectations.
The sensor doesn’t even exist, in fact.
If we looked closer, we would see that the door has a keyhole.
What’s more, there’s a ring of keys lying on the ground in front of it.
Sure, there are dozens of keys, but one of them will open the door.
When we understand this, it’s clear that more than innate talent, inspiration, or luck, all we need is enough patience to work our way through each of the keys until we find the one that fits.
Dispel Preciousness
There’s a phase at the start of every expedition where even the seasoned traveler does everything within their power to keep their hands clean, their feet dry, and their knees unscraped.
Compare that with the creature that emerges after a week in the wilderness, sloshing through rivers, crawling on hands and knees through thickets, and pulling themselves up steep slopes by muddy roots, and you’d be forgiven for thinking they were entirely different species, let alone people.
It’s only natural to maintain a level of preciousness about our comport and appearance when we start out on any project.
But make no mistake.
What serves us in civilized society is of no use in the wild lands where we discover and create our best work.
Better to dispel our preciousness early and get on with the work we came to do, using all the tools at our disposal, scrambling our way forward, and finding creative ways around the obstacles in our path.
Shed the hope of keeping clean and unscarred.
That life is but a memory now.
Bury your hands in the soil.
Soak your feet in icy streams.
And discover the freedom that comes from embodying your full potential,
Uninhibited. Unencumbered. Unafraid.
The Big Secret
The big secret is that no one knows anything.
That no one knows for sure that this will work and that won’t.
That even the most accomplished among us are still shooting in the dark with each new endeavor.
That the only proven path to success is to simply keep creating until you land on something that resonates.
That rather than exceptional talent, what’s required to create that work is exceptional consistency and commitment to your craft.
That the the best help you can find is not someone who’ll teach you the newest marketing hack,
But someone who can hold you accountable to your practice.
That each new idea is nothing more than a lottery ticket.
And that the only way to improve your odds of winning is to keep buying new tickets.
Eliminate Excuses
I would but…
I don’t have the time.
I don’t have the right tools.
I don’t know the right people.
I don’t have any ideas.
I’m not talented enough.
I don’t have the budget.
I don’t know enough.
I’m scared.
We all have a long list of excuses we call on to keep us from putting ourselves on the hook and creating something that matters.
More often than not, however, those excuses are simply a place to hide.
A way for us to avoid the real reason we’re holding back from sharing our insight, perspective, and voice with the world.
Fear.
We all have that too.
To get past the fear requires us to see it for what it is.
To get there, we need to first eliminate our excuses, one by one, crossing them off our list until we get to the root of our discomfort.
I’m scared…
Of what my friends will think.
Of what my family will think.
Of what my Facebook friends from high school will think.
Of losing steam.
Of falling flat.
Of failing.
And of seeing it through.
Of the attention.
Of the scrutiny.
Of the feedback.
Of the criticism.
Or worse, the ambivalence.
We can’t eliminate the fear.
But we can look it in the face and choose to create in spite of it.
It’s the only way anyone has ever created something that changed things, in ways big or small.
And if you seek to do the same, it’s the only path to get there.
Logging Miles vs. Making Progress
It’s easy to think they’re one and the same.
In reality, our mileage count rarely squares with the progress we’ve made toward our goal.
We spend most of our time running in circles–or in place.
We make small bits of forward progress only during rare flashes of bravery, inspiration, or motivation. Or perhaps when compelled to by deadlines and other external forces.
Otherwise, we pace.
Back and forth.
Round and round.
Out of fear of failure.
Out of avoidance of discomfort.
Out of what we tell ourselves is a lack of clarity.
We rack up the miles, convincing ourselves with each uptick in the odometer that we’re getting closer to our destination.
The problem is that walking around our neighborhood is safe. Known. Navigable.
We know the potholes to avoid. The speed traps. The nearest convenience store.
Out beyond the freeway where the tarmac turns to gravel and the streetlights run out, there are no such comforts.
And yet we know, deep down, that that’s the only road that leads where we’re seeking to go.
We know it’s going to be a bumpy road.
We know we’re going to get lost at least once or twice.
We know it will test our resolve.
But we know our destination is at the other end.
And no amount of miles spent stalking the streets of our neighborhood is going to move us any closer.
What Do You Want To Be Known For?
It’s a question worth asking yourself.
Too often, however, we skip it and let our reputations write themselves.
Rarely, we end up with a reputation equal to or better than we deserve.
More often, we end up with one that sells us and our work short.
Most often, however, when we let others write our reputation, it ends up fractured.
While we may be known for delivering solid work, beyond that, each of our clients, customers, and audience members has a different story to tell about what we’re uniquely positioned to bring to the world.
Of course, being known for delivering solid work isn’t a bad thing.
But most people deliver equally solid work and have the reputations to match.
Without a clear, consistent, unified message beyond that, it’s hard to stand out in a crowded market.
When you have a clear view of what we want to be known for, you give yourself a roadmap and a measuring stick to help you get there.
Whether it’s the quality of your work, customer service, communication, ease of use, or any other metric imaginable, having a clear idea of what you want people to say about you helps you craft an experience of your brand that encourages that narrative.
Just remember you can’t be known for everything.
Pick the one trait you want associated with your name and create a list of actions that will help you establish that reputation.
Then, spend more time pursuing those actions, making your vision a reality, until it’s so obviously tied to your brand experience that it can’t be ignored.
Then, watch as your clients, customers, and audience begin to do your marketing for you, with a unified message about why you truly are the best in the world at what you do.
Better Problems
Progress is often measured not by eliminating all your problems but by working yourself out of one problem and into another one.
If you’re lucky, the new problem will be a better problem than the one you just solved.
More fun. More rewarding. More interesting. More impactful.
Maybe even more challenging, if you have a masochistic streak.
Life without problems is a dreamy ideal, but it’s unlikely to actually materialize.
Pursue it as your guide if it helps.
Otherwise, just keep trying to work your way forward into better problems than the ones you solve.
Don’t Get Ahead of Yourself
Your default reaction to a new idea is to jump right in.
To get to work on the fun stuff, immediately start building, without first laying the groundwork.
Without deciding who and what the idea is even for.
Chances are, it’s not just about you.
Maybe it’s not about you at all.
Which means there’s work to do.
Research, conversations, patience, thought.
It’s true, the groundwork can sap the excitement from the project.
It feels as though you’re wasting precious time.
That if you don’t strike immediately, the opportunity will be wasted.
But if your idea, and your interest in it is so fragile that it can’t withstand some probing, questioning, and background research, it probably wasn’t worth much in the first place.
When it comes to the big ideas, however, the ideas with real potential, completing the groundwork only increases your excitement and commitment to the project.
When you find that there’s genuine market fit and audience interest in addition to your own enthusiasm.
These (and perhaps only these) are the ideas worth chasing.
Subscribe
Hi, I'm Jeremy, I'm glad you're here.
No matter what you create, I'm guessing you spend a good amount of time feeling lost, hopeless, and unsure about how to get from where you are to where you want to be.
So do I. And so does everyone doing creative work.
This is the Creative Wilderness.
Every week, I publish a new article in my Creative Wayfinding newsletter about how we as creators and marketers can navigate it with more clarity and confidence.
If you're building something that matters, but aren't quite sure how to take the next step forward, I'd be honoured to have you join us.