The Excitement of a Boring Routine

Mar. 1 2019

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Sometimes there’s nothing better than hosting guests for the weekend.

There’s constant action filled with great restaurants, hours at the beach, or so many other fun activities.

And when they go, it feels like there’s a void. Sometimes it can be a bit emotional.

But do you know what doesn’t happen when guests show up?

Introspection. Thoughtful work. Creativity.

Most people think that a busy, exciting life is the prerequisite for great inspiration, and a mundane routine is the death of it.

The opposite is true.

A boring daily routine is exactly what creativity needs.

Willpower is finite. We can’t force ourselves to have more willpower. If we’re supposed to write an article but we’re exhausted, we’re not going to write that article. That’s not weakness. It’s fact.

Navigating through high stimulus drains us of our ability to make brilliant solutions. The more chaos we take on, the weaker we become.

When we have a simple routine, though, our willpower stays intact. Everything has already been decided. Entire blocks of time are already programmed. We can get all the way to the evening and still have plenty of willpower left over–if we have a bland routine.

In boring days like that, the article gets written.

On top of that, we forget that creativity itself is a habit.

Creativity doesn’t come from a muse or from the seeds of spontaneity. It can actually be scheduled if we have routines as a foundation.

A guaranteed routine means guaranteed brilliance.

For example, if our brains know we have to be creative at 10 am every day, without exception, we will automatically fulfill that destiny.

If, instead, we start at different times (or not at all) because we have to put out fires or take guests to the Pancake House, creativity drifts away.

Muses are fickle.

They find somewhere else to be if we don’t show up.

Make no mistake, having a crazy schedule can be thrilling, and if we want excitement for excitement’s sake, chaos is the answer.

But if we want sustained brilliance, it’s the boring routine that matters most.

My book is called The Inevitability of Becoming Rich, and you can find that here.