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16. Establish a Strict Routine
The Academy Award–winning Icelandic composer Hildur Guðnadóttir, who most recently created the soundtrack for Tár, finds freedom within a locked-in routine. “Somehow, in the structure, there’s a lot of flexibility,” she says. “The fewer decisions you have to make, the better. Because then you can use that space for creativity itself.”
17. Go With Your Gut
“Trust your instinct. I always listen to what people have to say. But at the end of the day, I always just make the decision myself. There’s nothing worse than regretting a decision that you didn’t make yourself.” —Fashion designer Peter Do
“If something comes naturally and quickly and it consistently produces good work, that’s your gift. Trust it.” —GQ Wellness columnist Joe Holder
“Trust your instincts and take risks, even if it means going against the norm.” —Yuri Choi, cofounder of Savile Row tailor Yuri & Yuri
“Stick with your gut. Whenever I do R&D, it’s never as good as when I’m freestyling—cooking from passion and intuition.” —Calvin Eng
18. Stay Hydrated
“I try to drink a lot of water. Usually when I really can’t think I’m probably dehydrated. I wish I had figured out the water drinking earlier.” —Ramy Youssef, creator, writer, and star of Ramy
19. Freak It
Perfumer David Moltz, the founder of D.S. & Durga, bottles up unexpected scents—copper and creosote and wooden crates—and turns far-out ideas, like a Pixies song, into something you’d want to spray on your neck. “Be bold and make something that no one has thought of,” he says. “Don’t worry at all if you think people won’t get a novel concept. They will when they see how rad it is. Make sure you present it in the best way when it’s done. No one wants to see the half-assed early version.”
20. Get on the Horn
What does the fabulously old-school downtown publicist Kaitlin Phillips do when she’s stuck? Why, she picks up the phone. “I call friends, journalists, and especially boomers,” she says. “Sometimes just explaining to an older person what I’m working on makes me frame it in a new way and unlocks angles for me.”
21. Make Yourself Unreachable
Andrew Huberman, the Stanford neuroscientist and host of the Huberman Lab podcast, knows the power of boundaries. “I think one of the biggest challenges people have nowadays is feeling comfortable being inaccessible,” he says. “And I work hard to defeat the anxiety of being inaccessible for basically two hours of the day. I know people with kids will say, ‘You can’t do that.’ Actually, you can. There are things you can place in your life that will allow that. And the communications by text or socializing in person are far more enriching when you have segmented portions of the day where that doesn’t exist.”
22. Tune In to Your Dreams
All throughout human history, freethinkers from artists to scientists have mined their dreams for groundbreaking ideas. The designer Peter Do, known for his impeccable genderless tailoring, does too. “I have dreams about fittings. Within the dream, it’s very vivid. I know what garment it is—it’s a very specific thing so I write it down,” he says. “When I’m stuck, sometimes I’ll have dreams about solving the problems.”
23. Seek Out Honest feedback
“A trusted collaborator—it’s never too early to develop trusted collaborators!—can help you to understand when you’re too close to a project, and when it’s time to take a few steps back and zoom out,” says Ashley Clark, curatorial director at the Criterion Collection and author of Facing Blackness: Media and Minstrelsy in Spike Lee’s ‘Bamboozled.’ “They can also look you in the eye and tell you that something isn’t working. Surrounding yourself with ‘yes’ people is the enemy of true creativity.”
24. Enjoy the Ride
It can be easy to forget that the true pleasure lies in doing the work. “Remember to enjoy the process, as that’s where the real magic happens,” says Yuri Choi, one half of the brains behind the hot new-school Savile Row tailor shop Yuri & Yuri. “And to keep a focus on the process, as this can lead to new pieces and clues that bring me closer to my goal.”
25. Play the Long Game
“I can’t tell when an idea will be coming. So, I just need to wait. And search for something inspiring, like a photo, a film, a poem, a book, art, and especially listening to the sounds of nature, rain, the wind, the birds, looking at the clouds.” —Ryuichi Sakamoto, Oscar-winning composer, actor, and record producer
26. Swerve Out of Your Lane
When Hannibal Buress was starting out, he thought he was just a stand-up comedian and had no business writing sketches. Even when he was writing them for SNL, he saw himself as a bit of an impostor. It took some time for him to come to a realization: “Nobody’s born a sketch writer. It’s just a format and you adjust to it. To my younger self, I would say, ‘Stretch out some more, have fun,’ and also: ‘Dig deeper.’ ”
27. Don’t Romanticize It
“Creativity is a blue-collar job in so many ways. It’s like being on a factory line. You show up and you punch the clock, day in and day out, and you try not to get too caught up in the end results or how it will be perceived. Because that’s not your job! Your job is to do the thing that moves you, and to do it in the face of anything that’s thrown in your direction that’s trying to distract you.” —Rich Roll, vegan ultra-endurance athlete and wellness podcaster
28. Do It All
Kyle Ng co-founded Brain Dead in 2014 as a clothing line, but today it also encompasses an LA art-house theater, a pro wrestling federation, and a record label. He also pumps out nonstop collaborations with everyone from Chia Pet to Magic: The Gathering. All that variety, Ng says, is the key to keeping his mind fresh. “I always say it’s like a garden where you’re watering the plants,” he says. “If you only have tomato plants, you’ll probably be sick of tomatoes, right? But if the peaches are growing, and then you have tomatoes and oranges and strawberries, you’ll be excited for that next batch of produce.”
29. Be Your Own Hype Man
“I took a class once, and the prof, on the last day, said something that’s stuck with me. He asked everyone, who’s the best writer in the class? Everyone kinda demurred. I jumped in and jokingly said I obviously was, then clarified that I was joking. He said no, you’re not joking. It’s not a joke. You have to believe you are the best writer alive. You have to have a vision. You have to be a visionary. Neither the publishers, nor the readers, least of all the critics, have any clue what story the world needs to hear. You have to decide that. Go into yourself, tap into exactly the story you feel needs to be told, the story that only you could tell.” —Sean Thor Conroe, author of Fuckboi
30. Pray—Whatever That Means to You
“All writers are spiritual. They’re trying to connect with something that, for the most part, no one else can see. It actually doesn’t exist in the physical world yet.” —Ramy Youssef
31. Put in the Damn Work
“There is no substitute for hard work, stubbornness, and a resolve to do the very best you can.” —Joyce Carol Oates
“It often comes down to bulldozing your way through, putting in the nonstop work, staying under and in the work for a long, uninterrupted stretch.” —Sean Thor Conroe
“It’s not magic, it’s hard work.” —John Cale
The Editors of GQ
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