Recipe for more Inspiration by being lazier

Remember those times (usually the evening before a deadline or before you had to turn in your homework in school) when you needed to get writing work done and it just wouldn’t flow?

And the less it would flow the more it would stress you out? Until you force yourself to just do the next step and the next step in the next step…

And every step of the way is true pain?

And then when you’ve finished, later, when you’re brushing your teeth, or you’re on the toilet doing your business, or about to fall sleep… You have the greatest idea about how you could’ve done it a lot better?

That’s because you tried to do all the work by yourself.

You don’t have to.

That’s what you have your greatest ally for.

And if you make good use of that ally the actual workload that you have to do will reduce to a fraction.

That ally that I’m talking about is your subconscious.

The moment you learn how to harness its power you will be much more inspired in a lot less time.

Here is how it works:

1. Jot down your thoughts about whatever subject you are working on. Whatever comes to mind, without judgment. Just put it on the page.

2. Do something else and don’t think about it anymore. Go to work, go for a walk, do your shopping, hit the gym,…

3. Come back to your notes and sort out what is useful and what isn’t. Take down some additional notes that come to mind. Again, without judgment. Then, with the notes you have, write a quick first draft. It’s just a draft, whatever comes out is fine.

4. Leave it again, do something else.

5. Come back and rework the first draft to your satisfaction.

Depending on time and workload, you can keep doing this as many times as you want. Do some work, quick and easy, then let it go. Later, come back and rework it.

With the above recipe, you are practically “teasing” your subconscious to think about what you’re working on while you don’t even notice it. You don’t have to worry about a thing.

Here is the important part:

To make this work, there are two crucial things you need to keep in mind:

1. You need to trust the process. Trust, that the answer will come. It may not come in the exact moment that you want it to, but it will come.

And even more important…

2. You need to let go of thinking about it during working “breaks”. This is crucial. Otherwise, you’re not letting your subconscious to the work and you will worry about it all the time. You gotta let it go.

A perfect tool for letting go: