Your Creativity Craves Consistency. Here’s How to Feed It.

Sometimes it feels like the best ideas come out of nowhere. You might have experienced a eureka moment that felt like a lightning bolt of genius that appeared with almost no work at all. But if you talk to any working creative or dig deeper into where that stroke of genius came from, you’ll discover that it's the repetitive work behind the scenes that will get you to the good ideas and your most creative state.

No matter if you’re trying to improve your drawing skills, finish a novel or start a wedding invitation business, you’ll soon learn that creativity is a muscle that grows with consistent use. Daily creative practice can help silence self-doubt, overcome mental blocks and add more tools to your creative toolbox.

By diving into the science, psychology and strategy behind building a daily creative routine, you’ll be able to consistently come up with your best ideas for years to come.

Why Daily Creative Action is Important

Science shows that small, repeated actions will grow your creative ability in ways that big, irregular moments cannot. In the best-selling book Atomic Habits, author James Clear shares how small, consistent daily habits compound over time and lead to massive transformations. He believes that building systems that encourage small changes, rather than simply setting goals, can help you create sustainable and meaningful daily habits.

The Science Behind Building a Sustainable Creative Practice

Neuroscience reveals that repeated actions strengthen your neural pathways through a process called long-term potentiation. The more often you tap into your creativity, the faster and more effectively your brain becomes at accessing your creative ideas and processes.

You might have heard that 10,000 hours is the amount of time it takes to become an expert at something, but it's not just the quantity of time you put in. Psychologist Anders Ericsson, also known as the “expert on experts,” coined the term “deliberate practice” to describe how it takes focused, consistent repetition to really be an expert in your field. You can’t just do something over and over without trying. You need to work with intention.

Twyla Tharp is a world-renowned dancer and choreographer known for her decades-long career, which has earned her major awards, including a Tony Award and two Emmys. Her creative insights don’t just come from theory but a lifetime of consistently producing critically acclaimed and groundbreaking work across dance, theater and film.

In her book, The Creative Habit, Tharp shares that routine isn’t the enemy of creativity but rather the foundation for it. She believes her “magical gift” of creativity didn’t fall from the heavens, but was instead a result of her commitment to routines, discipline, and daily structure.

Tharp had a strict morning routine that included a two-hour workout. She also found that solitude, a dedicated physical space to work and having a specific storage place for each of her projects, which for Tharp were cardboard file boxes, helped her stay organized and motivated.

The Benefits of Daily Creative Practice

Taking time to be creative each day can also boost your mood and mental health. Studies show that engaging in creative activities every day can improve your emotional well-being, all while reducing symptoms of anxiety and depression.

Small daily wins, such as completing a sketch each morning or writing a paragraph for your blog, can also help build creative confidence. Newfound confidence can help you trust your creative instincts more effectively and reduce your fear of failure.

Graphic designer and illustrator, Kyle Aaron Parson believes that most creatives fail because they fail to push past moments of creative block and bad ideas. He finds that people are often overly critical of their initial ideas and tend to give up too early. He finds that highly creative people put in the time and work, even when they’re not feeling especially inspired, in order to generate their best ideas. He considers creativity a muscle that can be developed by committing to daily creative exercises.

Teacher Tip: Creativity Means Consistency
“The one thing that applies to all achievements is consistency. It's the same with creativity. We all have different ways of learning and different goals. We will have to discover what works for us based on our wants and our needs. But the most important part to move towards success is consistency in your practice.”
Kyle Aaron Parson, graphic designer, illustrator and teacher of Creativity Blast! Expand Your Creative Potential with 5 Daily Exercises

How Daily Practice Fosters Creative Breakthroughs

Even though you might feel like your big ideas come out of nowhere, they really come from hours or years of previous consideration and creative practice. Building a pattern of showing up consistently, even when it feels like nothing is happening, will enhance the quality of your creativity and increase the quantity of your good ideas.

Consistent practice will teach you that you don’t need a perfect idea to get started. You just need to start. Sarah Edwards, a creative success coach, shares that most of her clients abandon their work when they don’t know what they’re trying to achieve or how. A daily creative routine will help you learn the best way to work for you and your specific goals.

Cal Newport is an MIT-trained computer science professor at Georgetown University. In his book Deep Work, he reveals that focus compounds. This means that the more you do something, the more skill, mental endurance, and ease you’ll achieve over time. Over a few weeks of daily practice, you’ll notice that this accumulated focus leads to bigger results than spontaneous creative sessions would have.

Building Your Own Creative Daily Routine

The benefit of establishing a creative routine is that you can tailor it to your unique skills and goals. You can design a daily practice that is sustainable, rewarding and tailored to your life.

Make Your Routine Unique to You

Just because someone you know wakes up at 5 a.m. every day to work doesn’t mean you have to. Before you start holding yourself to specific goals and habits, take the time to evaluate your own rhythms, strengths, and needs. You can do so by asking your questions, like:

What are your creative goals?
When do you feel the most energized and focused?
What kind of creative environment makes you feel safe and inspired?
When do most of your good ideas come to you?

In “Unlock Creativity: Design Your Unique Creative Flow Map,” Agatha Vieira shares that the fact that your best drawing ideas come to you in the shower, on a walk or right before you go to sleep isn’t a surprise. This happens because your brain operates in two distinct modes. The focus mode is analytical and critical in nature. It works well when solving problems but it’s not as good at being creative.

When your mind is in its relaxed and open state, it is in diffusion mode. In this mode, your ideas will connect effortlessly. Creativity needs space to breathe, but everyone finds that space differently.

Try writing down three moments when an idea comes easily to you. Look at what you were doing—maybe walking, relaxing or daydreaming—and what you weren’t—likely staying away from stress, screens and noise. In this self-reflection, you’ll find your personal recipe for creative flow.

Decide Where You’ll Work

Maya Angelou preferred simple, uninspiring workspaces when writing her emotionally charged and visually rich works. She would rent a small hotel room every day so she could write without distraction. With her, she’d bring a bible, a dictionary, a deck of cards and a bottle of sherry.

Claude Monet worked in his home and gardens, which were filled with color and a constant flow of new life. You should find a primary creative space, such as a desk, studio, or a designated corner in your home, and make it a place you want to return to every day. Try to create a space with:

Limited distractions
Decor that inspires and sparks joy
Soft, natural lighting
Your tools are organized and ready to use

Next, select two alternative locations where you can work from occasionally. Changing your environment can help you gain a fresh perspective and overcome creative blocks.

In his class, “The Creative Toolkit: 6 Techniques to Spark Original Ideas,” writer Esteban Gast discusses a concept called “collisions per capita” and how it contributes to generating creative thoughts. Collisions per capita happen when you encounter something new that you usually wouldn’t interact with.

Research shows that increasing these collisions can help you develop new thought patterns and, therefore new ideas. You can increase these collisions per capita by changing up your daily routine, increasing spontaneous interactions and exchanging ideas with people you usually wouldn’t.

Teacher Tip: Change up Your Workspace
“Here is something that most people don't realize about creative blocks. They are often not about the work itself. They are about where you're working. Think about it. Writers often switch cafes, artists work in different studios, musicians record in unfamiliar places. These aren't quirks. These are strategies. New environments create new neural connections, possibilities, and perspectives.”
Agatha Vieira, Graphic Designer, Illustrator & Mentor and teacher of Unlock Creativity: Design Your Unique Creative Flow Map

Determine What Time You’ll Work

Just because an influencer you follow says they’re successful because they wake up every day at 5 a.m. doesn’t mean you have to. There’s no guide to creativity that works for everyone. To find the best time of day for your creative work, ask yourself questions like:

When do you feel the most alert?
When do you have the most alone time?
When are you the least distracted?
When do ideas come to you the most naturally?

Choose a time that fits into your schedule and then commit to attending it.

Choose Creativity-Boosting Habits to Add to Your Routine

There are dozens of ways to find inspiration and spark creativity but you’ll need to find the best one for you. Here are a few things you might consider working into your routine:

A visual reward system, like adding a marble to a jar each time you complete a task
Taking a short walk or doing a few squats before getting started
A short stretch or dance break
Bullet journaling

Habit stacking can also help you create triggers that make it easier for your brain to shift into creative gear. To do this all you have to do is link your creative practice to an existing habit. Write for ten minutes right after your morning coffee or paint for twenty minutes after your daily yoga class.

Build Your Community

Research shows that creativity thrives through connection. By building community into your creative habits, you can spark more new ideas and encounter concepts that might lead to creative breakthroughs. You can do this through:

Working in tandem with someone else on different projects (sometimes referred to as body doubling)
Join a creative challenge
Interact with other creatives on social media or learning platforms like Skillshare
Check in with a friend about your progress on a particular project

Getting Started

You don’t need to completely overhaul your life to get started, you just need to carve out fifteen minutes a day that you might have been using to watch TV, scroll on your phone or play video games to be creative. As a recap, here’s how you can kick off your daily practice as early as tomorrow:

Evaluate what you need as an artist to stay creative.
Choose one creative goal to focus on this week.
Pick a consistent time and space to work every day.
Set a timer for the amount of time you’d like to work.
Reward and record your sessions by checking off a to-do list or adding a dollar to a jar to save up for a treat at your favorite coffee shop.

If you’re not sure where to start, you might try checking out some daily watercolor prompts, bullet journaling, keeping a daily sketchbook or looking into a list of mood-lifting creative projects.

Time to Dive In

The path to creative growth isn’t about waiting until you feel ready or you have the perfect idea. All great creatives have their own ways to stay consistent and push through bad ideas until they get to their good ones.

Daily creative practice is one of the science-backed keys to creative breakthroughs, sparking new ideas, silencing your inner critic and building a sustainable creative life. While it might start with one day, one habit or one page at a time, you’ll be on your way to building a creative life you might have only dreamed of.

Your best ideas are already brewing in you. All you need to do is show up and dive right in.

Written By

Calli Zarpas

Producer & Writer by occupation. Ceramicist & Newsletter Editor by avocation.