Keeping Inspiration in Your Back Pocket

Written by Alina

“Amateurs sit and wait for inspiration, the rest of us just get up and go to work.”
Stephen king

As a creative, I’ve found myself relying on inspiration many times to get something done. I have told myself, “Ehhh, I’m just not inspired today” and used that as an excuse to not get anything done. Unfortunately, inspiration doesn’t always “hit”, so if we’re JUST relying on inspiration, the chances of us getting much done are pretty slim.

I was taking a masterclass the other day and the instructor stated a quote by Stephen King,

“Amateurs sit and wait for inspiration, the rest of us just get up and go to work.”

Welp. That slapped me in the face. This is a man who wrote over 61 novels, 200 short stories, and 20 novellas. In the 73 years that he has been alive, he has definitely applied this to his life.

Keeping inspiration in your back pocket.

Inspiration Doesn’t Appear Out of Nowhere

Let’s be clear, inspiration is great. However, we must do certain things in order to keep inspiration in our back pockets. Inspiration doesn’t just appear. Inspiration is a result of a constant feeding of our inner self. When spur-of-the-moment inspiration fails, we gotta pull from our back pocket.

One of the major things we can do to make sure that inspiration is kept in our back pocket is to be consistently consuming content. This includes content that we might not enjoy, but can still learn from.

Take some time to watch movies/tv shows, read books, read blogs, listen to podcasts, learn a new skill, doodle daily, or look at art pieces. When we do the work to seek out inspiration and not simply wait for it— our unconscious creativity kicks in. Before you know it, you’ll be hit with the next groundbreaking idea in the shower. Not by chance, but because you have been intentional about filling your life up with things that will in turn inspire you later (without you even realizing it!).

Like motivation, we must not wait for inspiration to strike to get things done. But keeping inspiration in your back pocket can work in conjunction with consistency so that it produces productivity .