Habits to Help You Balance a Creative Life

With everything going on in our lives, it’s common to feel as if our creative life needs to be put on the back burner. There’s no time to focus on our creations or balance yet another thing in our day-to-day.

I feel like I’ve done a decent job at balancing my creative life yet still find myself struggling when things get a little hectic in the other aspects of my life. Our creative life is important in keeping us healthy, and our continual growth in something we love helps us take a break from the crazy.

But I’ve developed habits for these crazy moments that keep me grounded in my creations. These are the small, and sometimes big, mindset shifts that keep me focused on maintaining a balanced life.

Confidence

You have to believe you can balance your different lives. If your self-talk is always focused on how busy you are and how you’re barely juggling things, you’re going to continually be disappointed. Go in with confidence. Know that it’s possible to maintain your creations while doing life. You are capable of achieving your goals.

Between balancing my writing, work, and relationship, I feel like there aren’t enough hours I can stay awake during the day. Instead of getting frustrated that I can’t get as much done as I want on my projects, I am confident that because I have other great habits surrounding my life, I can get really good work done when I am present with it.

Focus

When you are working on your creations, that’s all you should be focused on. Let go of the rest of your day and deep dive into your creative work. Get caught up in the flow by scheduling your creative work for your most productive time of day. If you can’t do that, just build time into your day where you can focus completely on the task at hand.

My best time to write is in the morning. I have the clearest mind, the stress of the day hasn’t caught up to me, and I know I’ll have an hour of quiet focus. I schedule my morning hours at home to be writing time before I head to work. The time cap helps keep me on task and working on the things that matter. I know I won’t have time to write until my lunch hour so I make sure I get a good portion of my work done early.

Health

Keeping a habit of health is critical for success in any aspect of your life. Prioritizing sleep, mental health, and physical movement are key parts of keeping your body and mind in peak condition. It doesn’t have to be crazy, but getting enough movement in your day and sleeping enough can do wonders for improving your work.

Because my morning is perfect writing time, I know I’ll have to sacrifice some of my evenings because I get up early. To get my best work done, I’m up by 4:30 AM on the weekdays. I’m not advocating you do this unless it works for you, but it means that if I want enough sleep, I’m getting in bed around 8:30 PM. I also make sure I move throughout the day, especially if I don’t come home and run in the afternoon. At the end of the day, I make sure I have a short session of meditation or journaling to de-stress and ready myself for sleep.

Passion

You’re not going to want to balance your creative life if you don’t actually enjoy your creative life. While I say you should be passionate about your creations, you can find joy in just doing a creative activity that is fun for you. I am passionate about writing, which means I’m passionate about building it into my life. Your creations should bring you some sense of fulfillment if you want the motivation of keeping it in your life.

Practice failure

As a writer, I never get it right the first time. With only an hour or so in the mornings, I don’t always have time to go back and fix my work right away. It also means I don’t have time to sit and make every sentence perfect the first time. When I write, I practice failing. It’s not perfect, but I always go in with the understanding that this is a rough draft.

With all your creations, it’s important to practice failing. You learn more from your failures, and understanding what you can and can’t accomplish in your timeframe is important for moving forward.

Because I’ve practiced to failure, I know that my morning time allows me to write just one article or post and make it good enough to publish. I don’t try to write anything more than that, and if I can finish early, I have enough time to edit an already written chapter of my novel. Knowing what I can reasonably do in a timeframe gives me the practice of maximizing my time.

Visualize

Before I go in and work on something, I visualize what I’m going to work on. It helps me continue thinking about my projects and prepares me for when I’m ready to sit down and work. If I know what I’m going to be working on during my creative time, I can maximize my efficiency in writing.

Visualizing your work helps you go in with a plan. It doesn’t have to be a rigid plan but it’s something to get you over that first hurdle of starting. I know that if I don’t have a vague plan of what I’m going to write in the morning, I waste too much time researching or looking for ideas. Instead, I go in with a general idea and visualization of my final draft and let my mind take it where it needs to go.

Creating habits around my creative life help me stay focused on where I’m going with my work. Changing my mindset to one of confidence and passion is critical to my success as a writer. I’ve been able to balance writing daily, publish every weekday, and launch a life coaching business.

Some days it feels like a lot, but instead of letting myself get overwhelmed, I reflect on my confidence, visualize my progress, and continue practicing. A creative life doesn’t have to be yet another thing on our plates. Use it to fuel the rest of your life and bleed confidence into your day.