Is it Quarantine, or is it summertime? It seems more like a season for introspection though!
Into our fourth phase of lockdown, the work at home and from home has become our new normal. A lot of us have reached a point of boredom, comes with being over-familiar and over-exposed to the same surrounding for a long time. Most of us feel less-inspired too, so how’s it that we keep our creative juices flowing though times like these?
As content writers, it’s all the more important that we keep ourselves stimulated, inspired and enabled. So how do we find the zone, when all the zone we have to ourselves is our home? Sharing a few tips that have helped me do better in my own work. You might have read them and done that before, but here’s my take:
1) Put on those headphones: Ever realised why you keep going back to your playlist? Because it matches your vibe, has all the feels, precisely what you need to channelise your inner lyricist/rhyme master. So, put on those headphones and tune in to your favourites! Music is also a great way to help our brains switch to different tonalities easily.
2) Take cover under back cover copies: One of the most compelling ways to draw someone to read. Not too little, not too much, yet it’s enough to pique interest in a reader. Also, the most articulate way of conveying your story. I browse through my collection of thrillers and espionages - I feel that genre makes for the best back cover copies one can ever read. You could look up online if you don’t have them at home.
3) Use Humour as a tool: Find meaning and inspiration in the silly things we do, funny things we watch, read or consume. If you go to see it’s the crux of most of the stand-ups we see. The absurdity and the representation is what makes the content humorous and tickles our funny bone.
4) Get yourself some “me-time”: Working at a stretch and investing your head in too many things at the same time stifles our creativity. So stop yourself from reaching burnout and enjoy some time to yourself. Utilize this time the way you want, maybe sleep over it, do a quick stretching or workout, stare at the sky or just sit idle and do nothing. Basically, taking a tiny break also helps you break the creative block.
5) Turn to the Master of the Game - Came out as my most favourite form of inspiration this quarantine. Glad I brought this book home from the office right before the lockdown! So the folks at D&AD and Taschen have put together the best ads by some of the best advertising writers in what’s called - “The Copy Book”. Now the content and the ads in the book blew my mind but the real star has been a certain 5-point pro tip by one of the greatest copywriters this world has ever seen – the late Mr David Abbott. It moved me and it’s definitely something I am passing on to my team.
Now there is no particular order in which we should resort to these activities. Just try any of them at random and see what enhances your ability the best. So, which one do you shotgun first? And, if you’re already following something, what are you doing to keep that creative spirit up and going?
