She tried the door, and it was locked.
I don’t remember exactly how old I was. But I do know I was just starting to write stories. I was writing one particular story about a girl on an adventure. She was fearlessly blazing her way through the woods when she came upon a door built into a tree trunk. She had to go through that door. I didn’t know why, she just did.
Now, at this point, I had the creative momentum of a lubed-up Sumo wrestler on a mile-long, breakneck slip-n-slide. Scribbling furiously, hand and pencil barely keeping pace with brain, and before I knew what I was writing, I word-projectiled down on the paper that she tried the door, and it was locked. Cue immediate, palm-sweating panic. I thought I had written my story into a dead-end lined with molasses-flavored quicksand. My story had gotten away from me, I had written without thinking, and now I didn’t know what to do. The door was locked. I was an idiot. Or so I thought.
As an aside, I have a very real, teetering-on-OCD issue with eraser marks on an otherwise clean page. They are the lingering ghosts of the wrong words. A nagging reminder of failures past transcribed. I knew that I would have to rewrite my entire young adult yarn to get rid of that sordid evidence. The struggle was real in that pre-computer age.
So, there I was, stuck between a locked door and an inevitable hand cramp.
And then it hit me like a cinderblock to the face—I’m in charge here. The heavens opened, the frenzied gospel choir hit the high note, and I was back. I opted to have something sparkly catch her eye in the nearby grass. And wouldn’t you know it, it was a key. To the door in the tree.
Keep in mind, I was a young creative, green as chlorophyll-soaked leprechaun shorts, and admittedly it’s not the most interesting plot twist to my adventure story, but that’s not the moral of this after-school special. That moment—that pointy javelin of an “aha” that smacked my red corduroy overall-wearing self—completely shifted how I looked at writing, and at creativity in general.
I learned that you are never really stuck. There’s no such thing as writer’s block. There’s no such thing as “I can’t think of anything.” There’s no such thing as a dead end. Or a locked door. There is a galaxy of solutions orbiting every single thing. And that includes client briefs. And if that favorite campaign child that you have spoon-fed, fawned over, and completely spoiled through its infancy dies a brutal, gruesome, unthinkable death, there is always a more adorable and intelligent sibling able and willing to step in and take its place. You just need to stay resilient, with a healthy side of thick skin.
I learned that you have to let the story get away from you. Don’t overthink. Just write. White-knuckle your preferred utensil and scribble like the gale-force wind. When the huge herd of idea-horses is stampeding full-speed, you don’t stop to make sure one particular pony is brushed and shoed and ready for the horse show. You need to wrangle as much of the herd as possible, fence them in, and then you weed out the show ponies from the rest. But first, ride the stampede.
I learned that leaking out any flavor of panic was a waste of time and energy. Take each situation as it comes, even in the midst of conflicting information and moving targets. Solve it. Send it off. Keep it cool and keep it even. Great ideas flourish in a happy place. And happy is a choice.
Looking back, I got a Costco-sized serving of wisdom from that securely locked door. I learned a more streamlined, intuitive way to get to that great idea. For efficiency’s sake. And with constantly shrinking deadlines and budgets, efficiency is the gob of gravy on that rice cake. Makes it a little easier to swallow.
This perspective shift can make a big difference. I leverage it at every turn. At this point in my career, I want to make an impact. I want to contribute positively to the work and the culture of a place. I want to lead by example, and help make future forces-to-be-reckoned-with out of today’s worker bees. Every creative needs to let the story get away. Every creative needs to be confident that the solutions are infinite. Every creative needs to give ideas a happy place to grow.
Every creative can do these things. We just need to be unlocked.
Much like that door in the tree, so very long ago.