5 Daily Habits Of Successful Creators
Yesterday in church there was a comment from a church leader that really stood out to me. He was talking about how when young men return from serving an 18-24 month mission for the church they are, at that moment, quite susceptible to losing faith and falling away from the church.
Interesting after such an intense period of spirituality and service that their faith would waver in the months after returning home.
He mentioned that with every young person he met with he would share a list of five habits that if they built and kept, they would never have to worry about their faith.
It made me think about what four or five habits creatives could use to all but guarantee success in their creative lives.
Here's what I came up with:
1. Daily Progress Toward Your Goals
Committing to MPED or Make Progress Every Day is one of the most important and effective things you can do for your creative work.
Whether 20 or 60 or 300 minutes a day, commit to making progress every single day. Start a streak, and don't break the chain.
2. Daily Connection With Your Vision And Purpose
I wrote a bunch about vision and purpose for the book, but it's important to have a daily habit to refocus on the big picture, the destination that you're working toward every day.
It's easy to get distracted and have a project or an idea or even an email or a comment take you off course for the day, or for longer.
By daily reconnecting with your bigger vision, you'll ensure that you stay on track.
3. Daily Contribution
The work we do as creatives and artists, in its highest form, is a service to those who interact with it. You are able to impact and change people through your words, your art, your music.
Approach your time online and in communities with a "lead with value" mentality. Before any money has changed hands, treat people like they're already in your care as a customer or client. They'll start to see themselves that way, and will have a much higher affinity for you and your work.
4. Daily Learning by Chasing Your Curiosity
I was honestly a bit shocked to hear that Joe Pulizzi, the founder of The Tilt and author of Content, Inc. spends hours a day consuming podcasts and articles. He is constantly chasing his curiosity, and the result is that he has more content to share with his audience, but is also at the forefront of emerging opportunities in Web3 and creator coins.
5. Daily Observation of What's Working and What Isn't
This last one speaks to the difference between a creative person and a creative business owner.
When you start taking responsibility for the results you get in your business everything changes. One of the simplest secrets to success is to do more of what works and less of what doesn't.
If you take time each day or each week (using a tool like Benchmark App) to keep track of your finances, sales, marketing, and advertising data, you can make better-informed decisions.
I'm nearly done with the Craftsman Creative Book that I've been writing in public for the last three months. Crazy how fast it's gone by!
I have three chapters left which will all be written by tomorrow. The book should end up around 60,000 words and is currently in the hands of an extremely talented developmental editor to improve it over the next draft or two.
The plan is to release it in March/April of 2022. If you haven't yet, sign up to get a free PDF copy of the book when it's released, using the signup in the bottom right of the screen.
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Daren Smith
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