Creating Novelty to Increase Productivity
Hear the full conversation between Matt D’Avella Steven Kolter about strategies to increase focus and enter the state of flow.
For many of us, the last eight months have felt overwhelming. It has left many feeling mentally and emotionally exhausted and unmotivated to work on creative projects. But as we continue to navigate uncertainty, the one thing that I am always sure about—and have come to accept—is that I’m not always going to feel motivated to write. This is okay. It happens and it’s not a reason to beat myself up. On the one hand, feeling unmotivated might be a sign that a break is needed, but more often than not it’s a matter of discipline and getting into the zone. To help me focus, I employ productivity strategies that I picked up from Matt D’Avella.
I’m a big fan of Matt D'Avella’s videos and podcast series. Some of you may know him as the Minimalism guy (he directed the documentary and is a minimalist himself). And while he does talk about minimalism quite a bit on his channel, he also talks about business and finance, mental health, and productivity. Earlier this year he put out a video called “The Secret to Superhuman Performance,” where he talks to author and journalist Steven Kolter about “flow.” Flow is an “optimal state of consciousness where we feel our best and perform our best.” You may have also heard folks describe flow as being in “the zone” or when someone is “totally absorbed.”
But while science fiction movies like Limitless lead us to believe that being at peak mental performance means we are using our entire brain, Kolter explains that in reality our brain actually shuts down non-critical structures to give us more energy to focus our attention when we enter a state of flow.
According to Kolter, releasing dopamine is one of the fastest and easiest ways to heighten our focus. To do this, he suggests five strategies:
Risk
Novelty
Complexity
Unpredictability
Pattern Recognition
The two triggers that I utilize are novelty and pattern recognition. Novelty is the act of doing something new. One of the easiest ways to create novelty is to go somewhere new to do your work. Of course, given that we’re currently in a state of social distancing, changing your environment probably isn’t ideal. It’s hard to change your scenery when you can’t go to the library, local coffee shop, etc. when you need to get away from your desk (or in my case the kitchen table).
But here’s another way to add novelty into your writing routine: Try writing at a different time. I know, I know, finding an hour or more to write in general is tough, but it works. Prior to lockdown, I had been doing most of my creative writing at night, usually around 9 pm. But once I started working remotely I noticed that I was no longer being as productive in the evening. So I decided to change things up. From June to August I wrote in the mornings before work. I didn’t check social media or scroll through my news feed. I didn’t turn on the TV or the Be A Shark podcast. I rolled out of bed, made my coffee, sat down at my kitchen table, and wrote from 7:30–9:00 am. And when I noticed I was no longer being productive in the morning, guess what? I went back to writing at night.
But as writers, we know all too well that just because we sit down to write, it doesn’t automatically mean that words are going to start pouring out of us like an uncapped fire hydrant. To help myself focus and get my creative mindset steamrolling, I like to use the fifth strategy on Kolter’s list: pattern recognition, which is when you link ideas together. Instead of starting with a blank page, I start off by editing the last page that I wrote the day prior. By rereading and making minor edits, I interact with the text as both a reader and a writer, which allows me to make connections between where I’m currently at in the story and where I need and want to go next.
What strategies do you like to use to help you get in the zone? If you give these strategies a try, drop a comment below and let me know how it goes. Write on!
