As I enter a phase of high productivity, I am reminded of the parallels I detect between the way I interact with my creativity and the effect of addictive drugs (as I have read, anyway. I’ve never taken any, unless you count xanax.)
Acts of creativity bring on an emotional and energy high while I am in the act, but after the work is done, that high dissolves rapidly and often becomes a full on energy crash. Novelists call it the post-book blues, I think? I get the post-Flickr upload blues. I wonder if chemically, the act of creation operates in a similar effect–or is it really just the zen state that we enter when we act without thought, when we are in the “zone” that has the high/crash/addictive properties. It’s a bit of a chicken-or-egg problem in that context.
I find that the best way to keep from crashing after a project is to roll immediately into a new one. Finish a photoshoot, process it, upload it, bask in the awesome comments of my blog readers, and at least do 20–30 minutes on the next thing. The basking part, the positive feedback, is part of the addictiveness as well, and the part I don’t manage as well. It stretches out the high, I think, and carries the good feelings from the creation onward longer. After I post new pictures, I have a hard time leaving the computer, and not refreshing Flickr and checking my email 10 times an hour. I find myself craving that injection of warmth, and as it peters off, as all things do, then I get cranky and low. I’m trying to value feedback a little less, but given that my self-esteem is tied in some ways to the external perception of me, it’s not an easy thing to do. “Awesome image/story/website” are the phrases that boost my self-confidence more than almost anything else. I’m trying to change that, but that’s another subject entirely.
Do any of you have this problem of the post-work crash? How do you deal with it? What are your coping strategies?
Tags: My Writing, process, SF
