Sometimes, it seems like the unattainable Holy Grail. How, you wonder, can I become more creative, more imaginative, and more productive? How can I develop better ideas to propel my career to the next level? How can I impress people, get my work noticed, and boost the amount of money I earn? Well, for many of us, the answer is staring us in the face, but we just don’t see it.
Get. More. Sleep.
Getting enough high-quality sleep is one of the best things you can do to boost your creativity and allow inspired ideas to flow. It’s like an injection of extra energy, imagination and inspiration. How much would you pay for that if it were bottled and sold at a chemist? And yet, sleep is totally natural and completely free.
When you’re rested, you can approach problems with a fresher perspective, increased clarity, and an open mind for creative solutions. That’s why we say we’ll “sleep on it” when facing a big life decision. Because eight hours of quality sleep is what our brains need to do all that subconscious processing and let the best ideas float to the surface.
None of that, of course, is useful if you’re struggling to get decent sleep in practice. So, to help you out, we’ve canvassed the creative community to get their best advice and practical tips on improving the quality of your kip. We share the best below, plus you can read the full discussions on Threads and Twitter.
1. Recognise the importance of sleep
The first point is that most of us undervalue sleep. We treat it like a bank overdraft, so if we miss a few hours here and there, we tell ourselves we’ll “catch up at the weekend”. Unfortunately, sleep doesn’t work like that. It’s important to get a regular eight to ten hours a night; if we don’t, our minds and bodies will suffer. It’s as simple as that.
Implicitly, we all know this, even if we don’t admit it, because the results speak for themselves. “Without a doubt, I do my best work after eight hours’ sleep,” says Ben Kirchner. “I just find visual decisions come much easier, my choices look better, and I have the energy to keep working for longer.”
“I always sleep on it before I send off a finished illustration to a client,” adds illustrator ReesaBoBeesa. “After sleep, I have more clarity; I know what to do: what needs to be edited, what needs to be scrapped and so on.” Designer and illustrator Lisa Fernández Karlsson takes a similar line. “A good night’s sleep is the best fuel for a creative morning”, she believes. “More than once have I woken up with a new approach in my head.”
So why don’t we all make sleep our number one priority? Why do we think it’s worth it to lose sleep to “watch one more episode” of that streaming show that will still be here in the morning or to sit up obsessing over a social media feed that we don’t,