When Your Creativity Needs a Kick in the Pants

Posted: January 05, 2013

It's time for you to write your post, your article, your press release. You need to start on it right now. You start to put pen to paper. You've got nothing. If you've ever drawn a blank when it came time to write something, you know what a terrible feeling it can be. The good news is there are ways to get your creative juices flowing again.

Has this ever happened to you? You sit down to write a blog post, article, or marketing copy, and everything you think of sounds old and boring. Or you need a better way to generate leads, and the ideas just aren't flowing. It's like every creative bone in your body disappeared over night.

If you say yes, you're in good company. Even the best have trouble sometimes. That fact won't reignite your creativity, but there are things you can do to give it a boost, writes Robert Middleton in his article 5 Ways to Kick-Start Your Creativity and Boost Your Marketing.

One thing you can do, he says, is distance yourself from the problem.

"Recent research shows that if you distance yourself from the problem or creative challenge, you'll come up with better, more creative ideas. This is because when you are too close to the problem, you are more identified with it. It overwhelms you; you're worried about getting it right," he says.

But if you approach the problem as an outsider, imagining the challenge belongs to an independent professional who lives thousands of miles away from you and who works in a different industry, you are more apt to generate better ideas.

Sometimes a good ole' Google search can spark your creativity, Middleton says. Key in the challenge you're trying to overcome and see what others have written about the topic. The articles, blog post, white papers, etc. that come up can get you thinking in a new direction—helping you escape the creative rut.

Read the entire article When Your Creativity Needs a Kick in the Pants, at RainToday.com.