The Creativity Juice

A big part of my job here at Rocket Pop is trying to find a creative way to say something that’s been said a million times before.

“It needs to say, “Happy Holidays,” but more engaging. You have 55 characters…”

I spend a great deal of time working on social media posts for our clients, and there are many who have entrusted me with writing blogs for their websites. Like this one. Some flow easily, and I readily assume the language of the client. Other times, the creativity train runs off the rails…

Everyone is possessed with some bit of creativity, and while some flow more freely with the juice of imagination, there are tools to harness it. It can be frustrating, but the key is to figure out what works for you.

Stephen King, for example, has a strict routine. Over a career that spans five decades and includes over 65 novels and over 200 short stories (like “Rita Hayworth and the Shawshank Redemption,” which inspired the hit movie, and “The Body,” which became the movie “Stand by Me”), King has kept a reliable routine. He tries to write every day – even weekends and holidays. He starts by reading the last thing he felt good about to take himself back into the story. Early in his career, he wrote everything out on legal pads, but later adopted a typewriter and now uses a computer. No matter the format, he aims for 2,000 words.

Every day.

Jim Jarmusch is an award-winning filmmaker. He admits to being a thief in his creative process.

“Nothing is original. Steal from anywhere that resonates with inspiration or fuels your imagination. Devour old films, new films, music, books, paintings, photographs, poems, dreams, random conversations, architecture, bridges, street signs, trees, clouds, bodies of water, light, and shadows. Select only things to steal from that speak directly to your soul. If you do this, your work (and theft) will be authentic.”

It’s also okay to become frustrated with the process.

Ricky Gervais is a comedian, actor, writer, director, and producer. If you’ve not watched his series, “After Life,” stream it now. It’s wickedly funny, full of morbid humor, and is a deeply poignant portrait of a man wracked with grief. He said of his process,

“An idea is never as good as when it’s in your head. And then it’s just how little you ruin it.”

I once had the honor of meeting Daniel Lanois. He’s a musician and producer, and has helmed records by U2, Peter Gabriel, Willie Nelson, Emmylou Harris, Bob Dylan, and more. Speaking to him after one of his concerts, I expressed my struggles with my own attempts at songwriting. He thought for a moment, and said, “Don’t wait too long. You’ll say too much.”

More of a King approach, I suppose.

Here’s how it works for us:

At the start of a project, we do a deep dive into the client. We learn everything we can about what they do (or intend to do if a new client). We then start looking at their peers and competitors to help develop a language that will speak to their audience.

The next step is the Brain Dump. Our team meets with their team, and we issue an instruction: “Tell us everything.” We want to know what they’ve been doing, what they want to do, and what they feel has been holding them back. We ask them to look at websites and branding that appeals to them, even if it’s not in their field. Love the Apple website? We can work with that. Have a special connection to the Coca Cola logo? That gives us a starting point.

Now it’s time to brainstorm. We’ll start building mood boards and color wheels and word clouds, and each day we might add something or remove a few things, until we narrow down our choices.

At this point, we begin to develop a cohesive “comp.” “This is what we think your brand and website should look like.” The client will have a few choices, and by taking in what they like and removing what they don’t, we’ll have a final product ready for their approval.

The creative process differs for everyone. But like Lanois said, you have to start somewhere, and it’s important that you start. Revel in your successes. Walk away when you need to. Embrace your failures.

Late in his life, Pablo Picasso was asked how it felt to have created an entirely new art form in Cubism. He said something to the effect that there is no such thing as new art. Every one of his works relied on the art he was taught, and the art he experienced. In 1906, he painted a portrait of the writer and poet Gertrude Stein. When someone commented that Stein did not look like her portrait, Picasso replied, “She will.”

Let the juices flow, and creativity will happen.