Creative block.

Ah, the dreaded creative block. We've all suffered through it. And while it may not be as embarrassing as firing blanks in the sack, it still leaves you feeling less of a being. Well feel better impotent creatives help is at hand.

Scott Hansen, artist and musician, has compiled a list of useful tips from 25 different creative professionals on how to overcome creative block. However, since he never bothered to consult me I feel compelled to add a few of my own*.

1. Go to a dark place - Angst, depression, loneliness and blinding despair have always been creative sparks for me. After all what self-respecting artist doesn't suffer for his/her art. When I fall into a creative funk it's usually because I'm contented. So I focus on becoming more depressed or angry or isolated and usually this pulls me out. 

To get more depressed I like to watch painful repeats of Holland inexplicably losing the 1974 and 1978 World Cup finals. Despair I can easily find in the projected ten-year growth chart or rather negative growth chart of my stock portfolio. If I need to be lonely I simply end the relationship I'm in. As the tears flow, so too the ideas.

Initiating the anger phase is a little trickier. I usually dwell on the grand achievements of my friends, and there are many. Bastards! The key is not to dwell too long though. There is a fine line between getting inspired and descending into pathetic self-pity. The latter, like spending a night at a Best Western in New Jersey is not a safe place to be.

2. The "under the kitchen sink" solution or solutions - I won't go into the details, but one day I discovered, rather fortuitously, that a quick whiff of Drano makes for an excellent "unblocker" for the right side of the brain. Not sure what the neuroscience is behind this unclogging phenomenon, but it sure helped me out during a Merrill Lynch creative pitch. How else could I have created the brilliant, "No Merrill, No Bull" concept. Of course, like with all "stimulants" there are possible side-effects, including dissolving nose syndrome.  


3. Create a "final" deadline - A few years ago when I was writing my first screenplay, "The Spokesman", I became mired in a particularly stubborn case of writer's block. Nothing seemed to pull me out of it. Then one day I received the following message on my answering machine. "The results have come back. I'm afraid you only have one week to live", said the deep yet sympathetic voice. As coincidence would have it, I was indeed expecting results from tests I had recently undergone.

I would soon enough discover that it was a wrong number, but the shock to the system was such that I wrote more in that following week than at any time previously or since. Nothing clears the mind faster than impending doom. So now when I get writer's block and if all else fails I persuade my doctor to leave the exact same message on my answering machine. I recently managed to complete a short film after hearing those inspiring words from my doctor.

4. The nuclear option - Desperate times call for desperate measures. For instance if your creative block is work related you don't really have the time to experiment with antidotes. For these extreme cases I suggest stealing ideas from other sources. But for heaven's sake be sneaky about it. This is the age of the internet where you're one click away from being exposed. Mind you, that hasn't exactly stopped Republican politicians from now being against policies they were once for.

Personally I like to scour the far reaches of the globe for ideas to pilfer. Albania, for instance, has been a very rewarding place for stealing advertising concepts. Granted most of them feel like they're from the sixties, but then so is "Mad Men" and look how cool that is.

5. Prevention - Okay now that I've shared some of my tips for overcoming creative block, here is a useful exercise to try and prevent it from happening in the future. The next time you suffer one, try and remember everything that happened leading up to it, e.g. what you ate, what you wore, what you did. I discovered, and granted this could just be coincidence, that most of my blocks occurred right after watching more than an hour's programming on the WB network.

I've gone six months now without watching the WB and I haven't had a creative block since. Of course I am also depressed, lonely, angry, full of despair, I'm down to one nostril and if my doctor is to be believed I die tomorrow.

*According to my lawyer I must make the following disclaimer. Please be advised that all my suggestions, while effective for me have not been scientifically verified. As such I cannot bear any responsibility for any subsequent failure, nor adverse consequence.


(Sharing credit to Brain Pickings)