Losing your creativity is like losing your damn keys—you know it was there five minutes ago, and now it’s just... not. You’re standing in the middle of your own head thinking, “Awesome. Love that for me.” It doesn’t matter if you’re trying to write a pitch, solve a problem, or just get through Tuesday without screaming into a throw pillow—creative burnout sneaks in quietly. One day you’re on a roll, the next, even fun stuff feels heavy. So what now? Let’s get you unstuck.
Move your body to move your mind
Yeah, yeah—“go for a walk” sounds like every cliché advice column ever. But seriously, it works. You don’t need to sweat it out or reinvent your fitness routine—you just need to get out of your usual bubble. Switch up the view. Take a different route to the store. Sit in a new corner of your house. You’re not running away from anything—you’re just giving your brain a new place to stretch its legs.
Let yourself be bored for five actual minutes
Modern boredom barely exists anymore. The moment anything slows down, we’re reaching for our phones, our inbox, something. But boredom is where your brain does its best weird thinking. Give it room. Stare out the window. Sit on the floor and just… exist. No productivity goals. No “mindfulness” tracking. Just stillness. It will feel weird. Stay there. You might be surprised by what your mind starts throwing out when you’re not stuffing it full of noise.
Make a mess with zero expectations
This is the part that makes a lot of grown-ups uncomfortable: doing something badly on purpose. Not because you’re lazy, but because perfectionism is what killed your creativity in the first place. When everything has to be good, nothing gets made. So make something terrible. Bake without a recipe. Sketch something ridiculous. Write three paragraphs of nonsense. You’re not making art. You’re shaking loose the dust. And honestly, a lot of good stuff starts out as a total mess.
Write to remember what you even care about
When your brain feels noisy, journaling isn’t about “getting it right”—it’s about finally hearing yourself think. You’d be amazed what’s sitting just beneath your surface once you start writing it out. It doesn’t need to be pretty. It doesn’t need to be deep. It just needs to be yours. If you want a place to start, CreateWriteNow has great prompts that make the whole thing feel less like homework and more like a conversation you forgot you needed to have. Five minutes. One page. Let it out.
Share what sets you apart
If you’re trying to build a brand that actually feels like you, video’s one of the best tools you’ve got. It’s where people catch your energy, your voice, your take on things—stuff that just doesn’t come through in a photo or a clever bio. You don’t need fancy gear or a studio setup. And honestly, with AI tools that clean up the audio, tweak the lighting, and toss in captions, half the hard stuff’s already handled (this may help).
Talk to someone whose brain works nothing like yours
One of the quickest ways to bust out of a creative rut is to borrow someone else’s lens. Ask a friend what they’re obsessed with right now. Not your most similar friend—the weird one. The one who’s deep into sci-fi world-building or researching haunted lighthouses. Let them ramble. Ask dumb questions. Your brain needs new angles, and sometimes the fastest way to get there is through someone else’s rabbit hole.
Unfollow the algorithm for a while
If everything you’re taking in sounds the same, your ideas are going to start sounding the same too. It’s just how it works. So break the loop—read something offbeat, watch a film you can’t understand without subtitles, pick up a book with a weird cover you’d usually skip. You’re not trying to be deep here. You’re just tossing your brain a curveball and seeing what it does with it. That’s often where the real spark shows up.
Start ugly. Stay messy. Keep moving
Waiting to feel “inspired” is like waiting for your internet to fix itself. Start anyway. Especially when you don’t feel ready. Make the first version terrible on purpose. Scribble the plan. Say the dumb idea out loud. Nothing real gets made without pushing through that awkward, cringy first draft. And you don’t have to love it. You just have to start it.
Go wherever your curiosity takes you
You know those odd little things your brain keeps circling back to—some random topic or idea that just won’t quit? That’s curiosity trying to get a word in. It doesn’t matter if it seems irrelevant or totally out there. Pay attention anyway. Those are usually the threads that pull you out of a creative slump and into something way more interesting than whatever you were trying to force in the first place.
You don’t need to be more creative. You already are. You’re just stuck. Burnout, busyness, fear—it all builds up and muffles the part of you that makes new things. The goal isn’t to be brilliant. It’s to clear just enough room for your voice to come back through. That voice is still there. A little tired, maybe. A little quiet. But it’s ready when you are. All you have to do is stop pushing, start listening, and give yourself a shot.
Unlock the transformative power of journaling with CreateWriteNow and embark on a journey of healing, growth, and self-discovery today!
About the Author
Mary Shannon created SeniorsMeet.org, along with her husband, Bob, to have a website that allows seniors to “meet up” and talk about topics that are relevant to their daily lives. They hope to build SeniorsMeet into a supportive community of like-minded seniors.
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