The Creative Crash
When I am not coaching my beloved clients, I am still a producer in events, documentaries, and television. I hit the road this summer after a long hiatus to go back to producing video at a few music festivals. To be in Grant Park in Chicago at Lollapalooza after a 5-year break felt like an incredible homecoming. I have spent many years being a part of the music industry in this capacity, but due to babies, a global pandemic, and a corporate job, I walked away from the scene for a while. Before my hiatus, I had fallen out of love with being a part of the festival scene or, should I say, the production scene. I felt like I was too old, that it wasn’t for me anymore, and I was sick of the hustle. Well, those were the excuses I used to blame my lack of enthusiasm and exhaustion. What was really going on before my hiatus was that I spent years, I mean years, in an extreme state of burnout.
When I reentered the ranks of Freelance Producing over the last year +, I noticed a few things: 1. I love producing and show calling. 2. I missed being a part of the production world more than I realized. 3. If I wanted to keep in the spirit of loving this career, I had to approach it completely differently than I had in years past. So, after a year, my new way of freelancing is new, improved, joyous, different, and more productive than ever before. And why? Because I make space for what I like to call: The Creative Crash.
Let’s take this year at Lollapalooza as an example of how I do production differently than before. For the whole week, my stoke was high! I was excited to be there. I loved being back with this crew that I have known for the better part of 20 years. I was determined and fired up to be the problem-solving, reliable, quick, and overly capable producer I know myself to be. The entire week, I worked on my feet for long hours in the summer heat and humidity, slept very little, and used my brain and stretched it in every way with little balance or downtime. So far, nothing has changed from my old routine.
What I know is that in these spurts of creativity, which in my case is in production, but you could say the same thing about writing a book or painting or working on a new design, that our body will keep going like the energizer bunny until the idea passes through and out of your body or the production ends. During these intense “creative” periods, it feels like you smoked or ate something potent. You feel like there isn’t anything you can’t achieve. Creativity, ideas, downloads, inspirations, and problem-solving are flowing out of you. My advice during this hyperactive time is: Keep Going!
The event wrapped up on Sunday night, and after a sweet goodbye, I slowly returned to my hotel to pack my bag and prepare for my early flight back home. When your body doesn’t have to chug along at a neck-breaking pace anymore, it naturally transitions into the next phase: The Slow Down. As the saying goes, “What goes up must come down.” I woke up in the morning and could feel my whole body shift from hyperactivity and focus to exhaustion. The pep I had in my step all week was gone. I went to grab the last of my things and noticed it took me a long time to double-check my room and ensure I didn’t forget anything. As I was boarding my plane, I entered the phase of what I like to call: Leaving Summer Camp.
If you ever went to sleep away camp as a kid, you know it becomes your entire world for a short time. The counselors become your parents, and the friends you meet become your siblings. 4 weeks later (or however long the camp is), you’ve had this unique and intense experience. You’re tired, ready to eat regular food again, sleep in your bed, and take a long hot bath. But when you leave camp and step back into your “normal world," everything feels slightly different. You are happy to have all of the creature comforts, but you’re lonely because the beautiful people surrounding you at camp are no longer there. Your quiet and civilized house starts to feel like an alternate reality. While you are reunited with your family, it is impossible to summarize or capture what you just went through. And all of a sudden, you feel like you don’t fit in anywhere, the grief sets in, and you don’t understand why, but you feel a little out of sorts and maybe even depressed.
Well, that low, out-of-sorts feeling is the same thing that happens when we finish whatever creative endeavor we have started. We have to remerge back into our “normal life.” While the world might be the same, we are different because of what we have experienced. We are exhausted, depleted, and lost with what to do with this new time and freedom. This is what I like to call THE CREATIVE CRASH. In my opinion, this phase is just as vital to the success of any creative process. The Creative Crash is uncomfortable. As creatives, we pride ourselves on creating, doing, making, and then starting the process all over again. Still, if we want to thrive in a creative environment, we have to make space for the Creative Crash, which means we have to feel the low, rest, stare at a wall, and sign up for doing nothing for a period of time. If we don’t, we wind up where I was a year ago: an extreme state of burnout where you start to question if you even have a creative bone in your body.
After I got home from Lollapalooza, I hugged my partner and children and made my way to bed. When I woke up the following day, I got my kids off to their camps and returned to bed. When I woke up from my morning nap, I watched bad television and read a book. I ate something nourishing, stared at the wall, and then proceeded to nap #2. Since Lollapalooza was only six days, I only needed one full day of crashing, but on some productions, I need more time on the backend. My body knows exactly how long to crash before re-emerging into the world. In my old life, I used to book meetings and play catch up with my life the day my creative pursuit ended, but now I have a hard and fast rule not to make any plans. As a result, I have loved every creative job I’ve been on and have more energy and positivity than ever before in my career. Who knew that doing nothing could be so powerful?
To Summarize:
The Creative Process: When you go through any Creative Process and the intensity hits, your only job is to Keep. On. Going!
The Slow Down: Once the Creative Process ends, you will experience a short phase called The Slow Down. During this phase, your body starts to reduce its adrenaline and dopamine intake and recalibrate.
Leaving Summer Camp: You start to feel like you are different from the world and no one understands you. You might even go through a phase of short-term depression. When this happens, feel it all.
The Creative Crash: Once you have eaten something nourishing and gotten a good night's sleep, your job is to go back to bed and stare at a wall until the point where you feel your energy start to normalize again.
I am living proof that following these phases in the way they are meant to be felt will lead to more sustained energy during your creative hyperactivity, less burnout, more enjoyment, and more space to be more innovative/creative than you ever felt possible. Try it, and let me know how it goes!
Always in your corner,
Rachel