With the frenetic pace of modern working life, you may be use to living with a super revved-up mind, one that runs on overdrive from the moment you wake to the moment you rest. That fast-paced constant whirring of your mental gears may have become your norm, who you are and how you roll.

Yet, there are two thinking gears to the mind that we’re all capable of using.

Psychologist Dr George Pransky calls these two different states Active thinking and Passive thinking.

In other words, you’re either pumping the pedals or you’re freewheeling.

October 10th is recognised as World Mental Health Day. Founded by the World Federation for Mental Health, it’s in its 25th year. This year, the focus is on psychological and emotional well-being in the workplace.

“Good mental health is fundamental to thriving in life. It is the essence of who we are and how we experience the world. Yet, compared to physical health, so little is commonly known about mental ill health and how to prevent it. That must change.”

The creative industry has a growing problem when it comes to mental health and it’s not going away any time soon.

The pressure of needing to create new, groundbreaking, pioneering, breathtaking ideas – daily, weekly, monthly, yearly – in fact for the whole expanse of your creative career, is a big enough work challenge as it is.

Then add the emerging culture of creativity-on-demand along with the rapid speed of disruptive technological change, no wonder more and more creatives are struggling with anxiety, stress-related illnesses, burnouts and mental breakdowns.

Police riot vans with sirens blazing, streets of football fans booming out chants and an automated bird-call squawking at regular individuals throughout the day. This was the surrounding environment during a sign writing course I took in London Borough Market.

It was extremely loud.

To add to this, the course was held within the Market Hall, next to the outer glass wall which extends onto the High Street.

Noises of people and traffic sat one side, while the hustle and bustle of the market sat the other.

It was continuously noisy throughout the whole day, so why was my internal experience of the day one of focus, flow and the enjoyment of spending 6 hours hand-painting letters?

The creative process is a natural function of every single human being. It is not exclusively creative, yet it is how ‘creation’ or ideas happen.

In 1926, Graham Wallas, an English social psychologist, observed this natural function and published ‘The Art of Thought’ which presented a model outlining the four stages of creativity, known today as the creative process.

1) Preparation
2) Incubation
3) Illumination
4) Verification (we now call Implementation)

Preparation and Implementation are the more tangible and conscious aspects of the process, the mental ‘doing’ – the intention, the brief, the research, the mind-map, the study, the materials, the production, the delivery.

Incubation and Illumination are the more intangible and unconscious aspects of the process, the mental ‘not doing’. (However, throughout the implementation process there can be countless cycles of incubation and illumination as an idea develops into production.)

Flow makes you feel happy.* In 1992, professor Mihaly Csiksentmilhalyi published a book about his decades of research into ‘optimal perfomance’ and put a name to this new psychology – flow. Over the years his book ‘Flow’ has become a classic work on how to achieve happiness.

Csiksentmilhalyi’s work was revolutionary in the field of psychology because until that time, psychology had almost solely been focused on the ‘negatives’ of human experience and behaviour, and not the ‘positives’.

In brief, Csiksentmilhalyi’s research shows that to access a flow state that can bring you happiness, fulfilment and even joy, you need to have a goal, either internal or external, to challenge your existing skill set, one that puts your ability to the test and requires your full attention to do so.

Renowned Austrian Graphic Designer, Stefan Sagmeister, turned himself into a design project to see if it was possible to redesign his personality to become a better version of himself and ultimately, a happier one.

With social psychologist Jonathan Haidt as his advisor, author of “The Happiness Hypothesis: Finding Modern Truth in Ancient Wisdom”, Sagmeister conducted three controlled experiments grading himself on a sort of happiness gauge, while partaking in a Health Meditation Technique, Cognitive Appraisal Therapy and Psycho-pharmacological Drugs. His personal life, his work life and the journey of both was meticulously and beautifully documented in The Happy Film.

Understanding what blocks you is the key to understanding what makes you flow. To understand this takes a journey of self-discovery, one that takes you from your outer world to your inner world, and to your experience of both.

Flow is always there, it never goes away. It’s a constant that just patiently waits for you to access it when nothing else gets in your way.

You innocently allow blocks to occur due to a number of outer and inner circumstances, yet both types of circumstances always point to the same thing – to you being the experiencer.

The question is, what are you really being the experiencer of?

I’ve always liked to question the ‘norms’ in life, why we accept them as the norm and if they are really true.

As our human experience is uniquely individual, created from our own personal beliefs, habits and concepts of reality, it’s always interesting to wonder how we get to a ‘cultural’ norm.

One cultural norm that is inherent in most people’s mind, is that to succeed at almost anything in life you have to work hard.

Working hard is the accepted mantra from the classroom to the boardroom and everywhere in between. It’s prescribed as the tried and tested way to achieve.

In 2004, Graphic Designer and Print Maker Anthony Burrill created a now iconic poster printed with letterpress blocks, which simply says:

“WORK HARD & BE NICE TO PEOPLE”

It’s a poster and a message that has become a maxim within the creative industry.

In creative working life there are a myriad of distractions that chip away, reduce and hinder your creativity. 

Among these distractions, the major creativity-quashing culprits are Network Tools; e-mail, SMS, social media and the likes of Twitter, Facebook, Google, Instagram, Snapchat… part of a list that will only continue to get longer.

Creatives are ideas people. Your job is to come up with and implement new ideas on a daily, weekly, monthly basis and to do this you need some headspace.

Network Tools fill that headspace with constant activity. They fill your head with thoughts that consume your attention, send your mind in distracting directions and stop you from accessing flow.

John Long, Group Creative Director at Ogilvy wrote an article ‘Why iPhones are killing your creativity’ in Campaign Magazine. He astutely describes the level of distraction that happens when we seemingly ‘work’ on a project:

At the end of last year was fortunate enough to attend a talk on creativity given by Sir John Hegarty, Worldwide Creative Director and Founder of BBH Advertising Agency.

Sir John has over six decades experience working in advertising and has received numerous awards for his adverts for Levi’s and Audi as well as many accolades for worldwide marking campaigns such as British Airways, Lynx, Johnnie Walker and Boddingtons.

He’s knows his stuff. He’s been there, done that, over and over again.

I have great admiration for Sir John and what he has achieved and pioneered within the creative industry. I’ve read his books and use many of his thoughts in my work, so I was all ears to hear first-hand his words of vast experience and wisdom regarding creativity.

After 10 minutes of a very enjoyable talk, he said something that I really wasn’t expecting: