lifehacks

March 2 2016

Band-Aid Happiness

Lena Inspiration creativity, habits, lifehacks, psychology 1

I find myself frequently resorting to “band-aid happiness.”

What’s band-aid happiness? Here’s what it looks like for me: A glass of wine after a long day. Just one more episode of The New Girl. Video games. Seeking the thrill of getting to know a new friend rather than cultivating the deep closeness of a long time friendship. Scrolling endlessly through Facebook and Twitter feeds. Refreshing my inbox to see if anyone’s sent anything new (but not responding to the 10 recent unreads waiting for my attention).

Earlier tonight I was sitting reading the excellent Resonate by Nancy Duarte and was suddenly overcome by a feeling of calm contentedness. I’d been struggling through a week of overwhelm and rush and had been only half-reading while running through my open to-do’s in my head. Finally, something in my brain clicked over and I gave in to reality: the only thing I need to be doing right now is reading. All that other stuff is just noise.

And it was like a warm breeze blew over my heart. I noticed my breath and took three deep ones in and out. I realized I’d been hiding from doing just one thing at a time — wrapping myself in an invisibility cloak of busy-ness and rushing from alarm clock to bedtime every single day.

We spend so much time dashing from task to task. What if we stopped more and listened? Listened to our own heartbeats; to our breath. To the voice inside saying “Please, stop, I’m tired. I’m not happy.” That tiny voice is drowned out by the cacophony of social media, TV, video games, meetings, Slack, animated gifs, cat videos… a neverending waterfall that, because it makes us laugh or cry or think, tricks us into believing we’re connecting to our real internal desires.

But internal desires don’t work that way: you can’t satisfy them with external stimuli. Instead, that path is paved through introspection. And introspection requires quiet. It requires single-tasking and getting to know and understand that tiny little voice.

Your voice may remind you how much you love to read. Or write. Or put together puzzles. Or create stop-motion videos starring household objects.

Maybe your internal voice really is calling out for just one more episode of Orange is the New Black. Just make sure it’s not the reward center of your brain jonesing for another quick hit.

Take the time to find out what makes you calm. Reenergize yourself by committing to those activities for longer than feels comfortable. Our modern attention spans are shatteringly short — break out of the cycle by spending thirty full minutes immersed in one of these activities. See how it feels, then re-enter the fray renewed and (hopefully) happier.

February 22 2016

Do you like to make stuff or do you just like stuff?

Lena Inspiration, Music creativity, habits, lifehacks, psychology 0

The other day I was listening to one of my favorite podcasts, Ask Me Another, and lucked into hearing one of my favorite creators talking about his process. The special guest that episode was John Darnielle, a staggeringly-prolific artist and brain behind one of my favorite bands, the Mountain Goats. Just to put his creative exploits in perspective, he’s put out 15 albums under the Mountain Goats name alone since 1994, not to mention all the other creative projects he’s been part of. That’s a lot of songwriting.

During the interview portion of the podcast, host Opheara Isenberg asked Darnielle about the release of his novel, Wolf in White Van. Specifically, she asked him if his creative process in writing felt different from his creative process in making music. Darnielle responded:

“For me, I just like to make stuff. And there’s a sense in which the thing you make, the form it takes, is really only the aftereffect of the creative thing you did. Whether it’s a song or a book or a conversation you have at dinner — the creative thing is what happened in the process, not the relic of it that’s the event.”

— John Darnielle

This resonated with me, because to me it cuts to the heart of why we do the things we do.

Am I writing a blog post because I want there to be one more blog post in the world? Because I want to meet a quota or publishing schedule or have something to promote on Twitter?

Or am I writing because the act of writing itself is enjoyable, and the process of thinking things through on paper is valuable to me?

I like to think it’s mostly the latter. But there’s definitely some of the former in there.

I’m going to put a stake in the ground and say it’s almost impossible to create anything remarkable if you’re focused on the first thing. If all you’re looking for is the finished product, getting up the motivation and inspiration to create something special will be pretty tough.

I had the same feeling reading On Writing by Stephen King. King talks about the urge to set up “just the right space” for writing, with the perfect desk and the perfect beam of sunlight pouring in through the perfectly-placed skylight — and nothing coming out. King says, “Life isn’t a support structure for art. It’s the other way around.”

Getting caught up in the accessories of your craft is as bad as focusing only on producing the end product. It’s fundamentally about an exterior perception rather than an interior motive.

“I should have this desk because this is a writer’s desk.”

“I should write this blog post because my calendar told me so.”

Rather, creative motivation should come from a desire to do the act of creating, rather than to achieve the creative outcome. That’s what I mean by the question “Do you like to make stuff or do you just like stuff?”

“I don’t care where I write, I just need to get these words on paper.”

“I have something I’d like to think through; maybe a blog post is the right place to do that.”

I find this liberating. I can write without caring what comes out on the other side; I can scribble and doodle in a notebook without it being a finished drawing. There is value in the act of doing, perhaps more value than in the product itself. Every time we create we build up more creative energy to do more, better, faster, or differently next time.

“The creative thing is what happened in the process.” Thanks, John.

February 15 2016

3 Simple Tricks to Train Yourself to Be More Optimistic

Lena Productivity design, lifehacks 1

I am what some people might call “relentlessly optimistic.” It’s pretty hard to get me down, and I get really excited when I have the chance to brainstorm improvements, execute on new ideas, or dream up a hare-brained scheme.

I might be a marketer by trade, but this level of optimism — a focus on a future that holds something bigger or better than today — is something I share in common with most other creatives. Jon Kolko, founder of the Austin Center for Design, said, “Designers dream of a future that doesn’t yet exist and work to bring that future to life.”

Optimism is also on IDEO’s Tim Brown’s list of design thinking characteristics. Whether the future looks like a particular gesture used to zoom in on a smartphone or a radical solution to global warming, design thinking and the optimism that comes with it are essential.

But maintaining an optimistic outlook isn’t always easy. We have deadlines to hit, briefs to meet, and stakeholders to satisfy — which can leave little time for looking on the bright side. If you’re feeling the pull toward “glass-half-empty,” incorporate one or more of these exercises into your daily routine.

1. Keep a Gratitude Journal

Want to be more optimistic? Start with gratitude.

A 2003 study of the effect of a grateful outlook on physical and emotional well-being found something interesting: keeping a daily or weekly gratitude journal improved participants’ overall optimistic outlook.

Let’s hear that again. Keeping a daily or weekly gratitude journal improved participants’ overall optimistic outlook.

You could improve your overall optimistic outlook — on life — by keeping simple notes once a day or once a week on the good things in your life. (The frequency made an impact on the percent increase in optimism — 5% vs. 15%.)

This one makes intuitive sense: by giving thanks for the good things in our current life, we might be inclined to think positively about our future life, too.

2. Practice Looking for Multiple Outcomes

Optimism in creation means imagining multiple alternative futures rather than zeroing in on one “right solution.” If you struggle to broaden your mind during a project, set some time aside right at the start to let your mind wander over potential solutions.

In marketing, we spend a lot of time thinking about the perfect headline for our content. The headline makes a huge difference, after all — people frequently click, read, share, and promote content based on the headline alone.

One of the best ways to come up with a great headline is to brainstorm way more alternative headlines than you might think you need. Upworthy’s recipe for virality requires writing down at least 25 alternatives before choosing the best. I’ll tell you from experience — most marketers stop at one or two.

Imagine taking this principle into your creative work. What if, rather than stopping when you’d thought of a single elegant solution to your challenge, you kept going? You could jot cockamamie plan after hare-brained idea down in your notebook without anyone knowing. You don’t have to use any of those crazy ideas — but hidden in amongst the absurdity might be a better solution than you could have imagined.

Casting a wide net like this on a regular basis can train your brain to think more expansively — more optimistically — by allowing multiple solutions to coexist at once.

3. Take Daily Risks

Pessimism can sometimes look a lot like fear.

“That would never work.”

“I’ll never make this deadline.”

“We’re doomed.”

These are all different ways of expressing fear around a potential negative outcome.

Optimism, on the other hand, is typically linked with hope — and a belief in the possible. Mike Wiggins, Chair of the Art & Design department at Abilene Christian University, said, “After teaching for 12 years, I’ve started to think of good design as a tenacious optimism: the belief that a better solution is just over the next hill—or cliff.”

Successful creators take risks. Sometimes big risks, sometimes small. If you’re naturally risk-averse, there are ways to gradually increase your ability to take chances, both in your life and in your work.

If you need some inspiration, Riskology offers 27 small risks you could take every day to get in the habit of testing fate. Suggestions include “Publicly state your biggest goal (1 minute)” or “Show your art in public (90 minutes)”. Taking small risks over time will build up your ability to take bigger risks when you need to — and have a more optimistic outlook on the outcome.

Shift to Glass-Half-Full

Makers are in the business of building the future. Creating a future that no one’s ever seen requires an expansive kind of optimism and a willingness to consider myriad options.

While some people are naturally optimistic or pessimistic, you don’t have to play the hand you’re dealt. By shifting your daily habits toward the sunny side — in the form of gratitude, open-mindedness, and risk-taking — you can become more optimistic in the long-run.

December 19 2015

Improve Web Productivity: Keyboard Shortcuts for Marketers

Lena How-To, Productivity lifehacks 0

I’m a pretty fast typist. I’ve always loved games, and when in 5th or 6th grade my class started regularly visiting the computer lab for “Mario Teaches Typing,” I blazed through every level.

Now, being able to type as quickly as I can think or hear, more or less, is an incredible advantage — I don’t know where I would be professionally if I had to think about where my fingers sit on the keys or hunt and peck for that next letter.

In the field of content marketing, typing out words at a nice clip has advantages, but I could probably be just as effective if I typed at 60 WPM rather than 100.

But there is a field where there are so many characters to hammer onto the screen that a faster operating rhythm is a material advantage: programming.

Programmers as Typists

Jeff Atwood (co-founder of Stack Exchange and author of the programming blog Coding Horror) wrote a now-famous post titled “We Are Typists First, Programmers Second” about the importance of typing competency — efficiency, really — in order to keep a train of thought alive while coding. In it’s FAQ, the programmer’s typing tutor typing.io argues “every typo interrupts the thought process not unlike a slow compiler or UI lag.”

It’s a controversial topic (just read the comments on Jeff’s post, for a small taste of the differences in opinion), but there is something to be said for the momentary distraction of shifting from keyboard to mouse when trying to get things done.

How do programmers become more efficient typists? Once you’ve practiced your way to 100 WPM, the best way to speed up further is to use shortcuts.

Efficiency in Digital Marketing

As digital marketers, we all have long to-do lists every day, much of which involves being in a browser and multiple open applications at once. I’ve found being able to dance around with keyboard shortcuts helps me get more done, faster, and break my train of thought less frequently.

I’m assuming we’re all already using basic shortcuts — copy, cut, paste, bold, italics etc. What I want to share with you are my “next level” shortcuts — things you might normally do with your mouse but are so much more efficiently done with the keyboard.

These are all Mac shortcuts because that’s what I use, but they should all have fairly similar analogs in the PC world. Here’s what Microsoft has to say about it.