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    <title>&ldquo;Switch,&rdquo; an article by <NAME></title>
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			<h1 class="article-header-title switch-title">Switch</h1>
            <h2 class="article-header-subtitle">Dealing with creative block</h2>

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			<p>Anyone who creates anything faces it. It&rsquo;s inevitable, and part of the process. So, how do you face creative block head on?</p>

            <p>You switch.</p>

            <p>One of the biggest factors that I&rsquo;ve seen lead to my own creative block is the lack of momentum. I might be working on a design or a piece of writing where nothing good is happening, and finally progress grinds to a halt.</p>

            <p>Creation is about inertia. Like Newton&rsquo;s first law of motion, it&rsquo;s most difficult to make progress when none is being made, and it&rsquo;s easiest to make more progress when you&rsquo;re already on a roll.</p>

            <p>When you&rsquo;re stuck on a design, lots of people suggest getting away from your desk: take a walk, put on some music, watch some tv—essentially, take a break and come back. While it&rsquo;s great to be able to clear your mind, starting from scratch again makes it more difficult to create momentum. It&rsquo;s the difference between pushing a boulder that&rsquo;s already slowly rolling and trying to budge one that&rsquo;s standing still.</p>

            <p>My solution: work on at least two projects at the same time. Whenever I feel myself slowing down progress on project #1, I&rsquo;ll switch over to project #2. I get all the benefits of starting fresh on something new, but I still have the opportunity to continue whatever momentum I already have. Certainly, there&rsquo;s <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2013/05/05/opinion/sunday/a-focus-on-distraction.html?_r=0">a toll to task-switching</a>, but I&rsquo;ve found it to be less costly than coming back to the boulder at a standstill.</p>

            <p>Some examples of things to work on simultaneously:</p>

            <ul>
                <li>A mobile view and desktop view of a site</li>
                <li>Two different pages of a site, like a Product page and a Products landing page</li>
                <li>Two different disciplines, like a site map and a comp for the same project</li>
                <li>Two completely different client projects, like a homepage for an ecommerce site and a homepage for a news site</li>
                <li>A mix of responsibilities, like a homepage for a client project and a homepage for a personal project</li>
            </ul>

            <p>In doing this, you&rsquo;ll start to notice some efficiencies, like some challenges across both that you could solve the same way. You&rsquo;ll also find that the differences between what you&rsquo;re doing become clearer, and you can approach them with more clarity.</p>
            
            <p>I&rsquo;ve been doing this for a while, so I regularly work on 4-5 things at a time. Through practice, I&rsquo;m pretty honed in on the point where I&rsquo;m being less productive than I&rsquo;d like to be, so I switch fairly frequently. Coincidentally, I haven&rsquo;t felt like I&rsquo;ve faced creative block in a long time.</p>
            
            <p>Your mileage may vary, but consider giving this a try next time you&rsquo;re feeling stuck.</p>
            
            <p>How do you deal with creative block?</p>
			
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        	            <h2>Article Info</h2>
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        	        <time datetime="2014-02-19T12:57:00">Published August 16, 2015 at 8:40 <abbr title="Post Meridian">PM</abbr></time>
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<commit_msg>Medium link on Switch<commit_after><?php require($_SERVER["DOCUMENT_ROOT"]."/-/_inc/functions.php"); echo "\n"; ?>
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    <title>&ldquo;Switch,&rdquo; an article by <NAME></title>
    <meta name="description" content="On Creative Direction" />
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			<h1 class="article-header-title switch-title">Switch</h1>
            <h2 class="article-header-subtitle">Dealing with creative block</h2>

            <div class="margin-bottom">
                <iframe src='https://spoken.co/t/2504893/embed' frameborder='0' width='100%' height='84' style='max-width:400px;'></iframe>
            </div>
			
			<p>Anyone who creates anything faces it. It&rsquo;s inevitable, and part of the process. So, how do you face creative block head on?</p>

            <p>You switch.</p>

            <p>One of the biggest factors that I&rsquo;ve seen lead to my own creative block is the lack of momentum. I might be working on a design or a piece of writing where nothing good is happening, and finally progress grinds to a halt.</p>

            <p>Creation is about inertia. Like Newton&rsquo;s first law of motion, it&rsquo;s most difficult to make progress when none is being made, and it&rsquo;s easiest to make more progress when you&rsquo;re already on a roll.</p>

            <p>When you&rsquo;re stuck on a design, lots of people suggest getting away from your desk: take a walk, put on some music, watch some tv—essentially, take a break and come back. While it&rsquo;s great to be able to clear your mind, starting from scratch again makes it more difficult to create momentum. It&rsquo;s the difference between pushing a boulder that&rsquo;s already slowly rolling and trying to budge one that&rsquo;s standing still.</p>

            <p>My solution: work on at least two projects at the same time. Whenever I feel myself slowing down progress on project #1, I&rsquo;ll switch over to project #2. I get all the benefits of starting fresh on something new, but I still have the opportunity to continue whatever momentum I already have. Certainly, there&rsquo;s <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2013/05/05/opinion/sunday/a-focus-on-distraction.html?_r=0">a toll to task-switching</a>, but I&rsquo;ve found it to be less costly than coming back to the boulder at a standstill.</p>

            <p>Some examples of things to work on simultaneously:</p>

            <ul>
                <li>A mobile view and desktop view of a site</li>
                <li>Two different pages of a site, like a Product page and a Products landing page</li>
                <li>Two different disciplines, like a site map and a comp for the same project</li>
                <li>Two completely different client projects, like a homepage for an ecommerce site and a homepage for a news site</li>
                <li>A mix of responsibilities, like a homepage for a client project and a homepage for a personal project</li>
            </ul>

            <p>In doing this, you&rsquo;ll start to notice some efficiencies, like some challenges across both that you could solve the same way. You&rsquo;ll also find that the differences between what you&rsquo;re doing become clearer, and you can approach them with more clarity.</p>
            
            <p>I&rsquo;ve been doing this for a while, so I regularly work on 4-5 things at a time. Through practice, I&rsquo;m pretty honed in on the point where I&rsquo;m being less productive than I&rsquo;d like to be, so I switch fairly frequently. Coincidentally, I haven&rsquo;t felt like I&rsquo;ve faced creative block in a long time.</p>
            
            <p>Your mileage may vary, but consider giving this a try next time you&rsquo;re feeling stuck.</p>
            
            <p>How do you deal with creative block?</p>

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        	        <time datetime="2014-02-19T12:57:00">Published August 16, 2015 at 8:40 <abbr title="Post Meridian">PM</abbr></time>
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