It’s a little hard to focus these days. More crazy shit happened last night than we would expect in a week (month?) of, say, 2015. If you’ve got a creative job or hobby, how do you put the world’s happenings out of your mind so you can settle in and create something amazing? Or do you embrace the emotions you’re feeling, and feed that fear and anger and sadness into a sort of mental meat grinder that can turn them into something beautiful?
Stepping away from the news is one solution, but escapism only takes us so far. Some of us need the news for our jobs; we can’t step away from the media because we are the media. And if some flames of the world’s current blaze lick into your life—say, if you fear that you or a loved one will be deported—turning off the news won’t change that.
So we’re inspired by this motivational poster of sorts, which gives us an assignment to “Feel all the things...and then FOCUS. Pick up your pen. Pick up your paintbrush. Pick up your damn chin.”
Look for the truth. (Yes, it is a thing—it still exists.) Focus on that light. Enlarge it.
That sounds great, but it doesn’t explain how to focus. So we’d like to hear what you do. How do you focus on creative work or play in this crazy world? Maybe you sit down with your creative tools first thing in the morning, before you pick up your phone. Maybe you have a routine that helps you turn on your urge to create. Maybe some of these strategies from the good old days are all you need. What’s working for you?