Create a Daily Habit
The Moon Man’s Field Guide to Being a Happy Creative #004
One of the most important steps on the path to becoming a happy creative, is being able to commit to a daily habit.
A daily habit is the anchor for your seafaring vessel, the USS Creative Happiness. A habit brings you back to your goals and your trajectory through stormy seas and blue skies.
Without a daily habit you’re nothing more than garbage tumbling in the wind like that trash bag from American Beauty.
As noted in the book Atomic Habits, a habit is a vote for the person you’d like to be. Every second of the day is an opportunity to cast that vote. It’s democracy in action! If you’d like to be a hero to your kids and community, cast a vote to do that! If you’d like to be the type of person who watches Maurey Povitch while eating gallon tubs of ice cream in your Spiderman pajamas, then cast a vote and have at it.
At its core, a habit is about developing and strengthening a skill. It’s the commitment to show up everyday to exercise that creative muscle. It’s about finding a contiuous cycle that promotes growth and learning, and finding that rhythm is instrumental to being happier.
Start small and make it easy. The habit might be tough to complete those first few days, as you work through that initial speed bump, but momentum will build, and the act will become almost self-perpetuating.
The Wild Moon Man’s own feelings on habits crystalized in 2017, when I set out to create one drawing a day for an entire year, in hopes of improving as an illustrator.
Daily I toiled, sticking to the daily habit system, drawing come rain or shine.
Through the challenge I ended up producing 365 drawings that became the “We’re all Gonna Die” project (seen here).
What this habit provided me was immeasurable in terms of skills growth; but, more importantly, was the joy found spent in the process. I learned it was the habit itself that brought happiness, rather than the accomplishment of finishing the project. The Journey is truly more important than the destination. Today, I still carve out time to draw daily.
As you choose a habit to commit to, I leave these tips to ensure your success. Decide on how many minutes and for how many days you’ll shoot for (make it a challenge, but achievable).
Once you reach the end of that period, you have a choice to keep going if you really enjoy it; or pivot to something else if you’ve thought of an idea that might instill greater joy or more aligned with your goals. Just commit to a daily act that will push you to improve and keep creating!
Tips on Devising and Maintaining a Daily Creative Habit
Do your habit at the same time every day–ideally when you have the most energy
Prime your environment for the habit–remove all points of friction from initiating it each day
Start with a set short time–make it easy as possible to get started (you can add time each day as you find your footing)
Reward yourself immediately after the habit (chocolate’s good, just try not to let it smear all over your mouth before going into work)
Find an accountability buddy or post your work to social media.
Write your habit in your planner and put a nice thick line through it when you’re done (so satisfying)
Give yourself time to reflect and process on any insight gleaned
Module #002 Challenge. Write down your intent for a daily habit and post it where you can see it daily. “I will _____ daily for the next XX days.”
*A Note from Wild Moon Productions owner Ryan Taggart
How does having daily creative habits help you in your creative business?
Habits are the building blocks that make any creative project possible. Diligently sticking to good habits is the only road to mastering a creative discipline. When you incorporate a system of habits into a project you set yourself up for success. Each habit becomes a crucial step in the process.
Walks in nature, exercise, healthy eating, good sleep, creative writing or drawing, mindfulness, deliberate practice–all of these things stack together to help you stretch and build executive functioning skills–the skills needed to successfully manage and navigate a project. The combination of these daily habits provide me with the fuel needed for me to work my best, providing me with deeper, more engaged sessions of creative project work.