Is commuting the creative secret sauce I’m now missing?
With working from home and hybrid working here to stay, could the commute be why I wrote so much over the last 10 years?
I’m one for lofty New Years resolutions, and a particular one that reoccurs on my list is trying to read a shed load of books before the year is out. I like to use the Goodreads app, which has a handy feature for creating and tracking your reading challenge.
For 2022 I’ve uncreatively set myself the challenge of reading 22 books. As you can imagine, October rolled around, and I barely had made a dent in my reading list. I had a massive stack of books in my home office that I’d well-meaningly purchased. But I didn’t make any motions to actually read them. That was until I stumbled on a YouTube video regarding the idea of a 12-week year vs a 12-month year. I won’t go into detail about this framework, as that’s a post for another day. However, this new productivity mechanism gave me the kick I needed to reach my reading goal before the year ended.
Many of the books I’d chosen to fill the latter half of the year have resided around resting and finding the ever-eluding reality of work-life balance. For example, I’ve just finished reading a book called ‘Rest: Why You Get More Done When You Work Less’ by Alex Soojung-Kim Pang. This book looks a lot at the restful habits of people we’d consider incredibly successful; think worldwide renowned writers, Nobel prize-winning scientists and gold medal athletes.
Why don’t I write anymore?
While reading the book and consuming its excellent insights about how leisure activities such as walking, napping and deep play make successful people (rather than individuals being successful and trying to make time for leisure), a reoccurring thought kept springing to my mind.
“Why don’t I write anymore?”
I was a heavy blogger at university, always sharing finished work and posting my thoughts and ideas about what I was working on. Once I had settled into the working world, I moved to Medium as it was a better alternative for sharing extended articles with a like-minded community.
However, I stopped for no real reason. Or so I thought.
Upon reflection, I really stopped writing when the pandemic struck in 2020. Our world was turned upside down quickly, and my focus on writing and sharing my ideas on Design was hardly my primary focus when fear and chaos surrounded us.
Working from home was one of the most significant changes to my routine during the pandemic. I’d commuted into London from Essex 5 days a week for nearly 10 years, and that suddenly stopped. And without my notice, my frequent writing also stopped.
Lack of commuting means lack of boredom
If I think about it, I write when inspiration takes me. Typically, my motivation for writing comes up like a fire from within, where I can’t type fast enough to get it all out on screen. But, unfortunately, that fire seemed to have gone out during the pandemic.
Could my previous commute have been the time and fertile ground for new ideas, insights, connections and the burning motivation to get these words out and into cyberspace that I was now missing?
My previous commute consisted of walking for 20 minutes in the morning. Then 40 minutes on the train and then another 20 minutes walking. Plus, I would repeat it all again on the same evening. Only now do I realise how useful it was to my creative process. But, unfortunately, we often feel that long commutes are time sinks and that our jobs requiring long-distance travel steal our valuable time.
Until now, I was always away or felt what commuting time took from me, no time for the gym, or home too late to socialise. I had never realised what my commute had also given me for free. It allowed me to let my mind wander. With the mundane and repetitive nature of walking and seeing the same streets and platforms, my incredibly overactive brain spent its energy elsewhere. My brain would seek out constant thinking instead to entertain itself while I walked or waited for my train. I would naturally think about things I’d seen online, books or articles I was reading, and whether I agreed with the points raised.
When I was participating in the ritual of commuting, I would use my notes app to keep track of ideas of things I wanted to look into later when I was at the computer. Now, I don’t have the space for my mind to be bored as I’m forever at my laptop. In a constantly connected world, new tweets or TikToks fill that boredom space where the natural time to mentally wander used to be.
I don’t believe it’s just the commute that aided my compulsion to write. Reading helps too. And I mean proper reading, not just random 50-part threads on Twitter. I mean good books where people have well-considered ideas and scientific studies or bibliographies to back up their words of wisdom. I’m sure others are different to me, but I’ve never been someone who reads at home, I always feel there is far too much to do than leisurely sit on the sofa and read for an hour, and this is what the commute on the train gave me. I made it worthwhile by reading when it could have felt wasted.
How to recreate a commute when working from home
Don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying that going back to the office 5 days a week is needed to ensure I’m writing again or having new ideas consistently. But it’s a curious reflection on the importance of physical movement and time to do mundane things and how new ideas and connections can come when not sitting in front of the computer screen.
I’m going to run an experiment this week where I plan to walk or run in the morning. The idea is to replicate a commute and see what ideas for writing spring come to mind. Of course, I won’t force myself to write as I think as soon as you make something a chore, that’s when you’re going to kill off creativity. But if my hunch is correct, then I’ll no doubt feel compelled to write.
I’m also curious to find what other mundane tasks could provide this space for ideas and mental space to mull over thoughts. Especially if one is unable to go outside or unable to walk.
I’d also like to hear from other creatives or writers who have noticed a connection to running, walking or other forms of movement and how it’s aided their creativity.
Fancy a chat?
If you have any questions or want to talk? Drop me a comment or send me a tweet at @lizhamburger
