Seasons of Creativity

I’m a believer in deliberate creativity. For a creative life, you need to develop habits of mind and ways of working that consistently lead to effective creative work. You don’t just wait for a great idea. Instead, you engage in a daily discipline. If you’re guided by the eight habits of creativity (outlined in my book Zig Zag) you can trust that ideas will emerge from the process.

So I was skeptical at first when I read Cal Newport’s article in the Sunday New York Times (February 18, 2024). It’s an excerpt from his new book Slow Productivity. His thesis is that creative people are really creative, for a while, and then they need to take time off. He compares it to a professor’s sabbatical, where the university gives them one semester off. They can go teach at another university, or study a completely new field–a change of intellectual scenery, something that will restoke their creative juices. The problem is that taking five months off from creativity is inconsistent with research showing that creativity is a muscle that you have to exercise every day. But as I read further, I became more receptive. Newport’s argument is interesting, and his article convinced me at least a little bit.

Last month, I finished a book that I’ve been working on for almost two years. It’s called Learning to See and it’ll be published by MIT Press later this year. I already have the idea for my next book project and I’ve already drafted over 25,000 words of notes. But I’ve promised myself that I won’t start in earnest until this summer. I’m taking a break from writing for the next four months, although I’m still teaching and going to committee meetings and all of the other professor stuff. It sounds like I’m doing what Newport advocates in his new book. Here are some quotations from his New York Times article:

The process of producing value with the human brain cannot be forced into an unvarying schedule. Intense periods of cognition must be followed by quiet periods of mental rejuvenation. Energized creative breakthroughs must be supported by the slower incubation of new ideas.

Still, this seems a bit too accepting of the “insight myth” of creativity that I’ve spent so much effort criticizing. Newport is a bit too enabling of those people who say they’re waiting for the next big idea. But creativity research says that you don’t get ideas from sitting at home alone. Ideas come from engaging in the discipline of creativity. If you keep engaging in the work, consistently and regularly, you can trust that ideas will emerge.

Organizations might consider adapting the idea of sabbaticals from academia. Professors are typically offered one or two semesters free from teaching roughly once every seven years.

Every seven years–I wish! My last sabbatical was in 2009-2010. But my time off worked like Newport says– I moved to Savannah, Georgia, for 6 months, as a visiting professor at the Savannah College of Art and Design. That’s where I got the idea to study how professors teach in art and design school. That idea was substantial enough that it kept me engaged for the last 14 years. Since 2010, I visited art and design schools around the U.S. and I’ve published numerous scientific articles about what goes on in studio classes. This is the topic of my forthcoming book Learning to See.

Extracting value from the human brain is not something that can be regularized like installing a steering wheel on a Model T.

I have mixed feelings about Newport’s claims. I worry that it might reinforce the linear insight myth of creativity–the belief that you need to wait for the mysterious great idea to occur to you, and the belief that when you’re working hard, you’re blocking that possibility. My research shows that for the most part, this isn’t the case–ideas come from engaging with the work. And yet, I got a lot out of my 2010 sabbatical and I’ve just asked my university for a sabbatical in Spring 2025. But that’s only one sabbatical every 15 years. Newport’s article suggests that companies should give their employees time off every few months. Provocatively, he says that “quiet quitting” might be good for creativity and maybe you should secretly plan to not work as hard every July or in the month leading up to Christmas. If your boss notices, you can give him a copy of Newport’s book!

It’s an interesting thesis and I look forward to reading Cal Newport’s new book Slow Productivity: The Lost Art of Accomplishment Without Burnout.