A friend told me recently, “a vision without a plan is a hallucination.” I like that. It got me thinking.
I’ve spent a lot of time in my life fighting a quiet friction. An internal tug of war. A pendulum that swings back and forth.
On one side is the Creative. The flow state. The lifeblood of joy.
On the other side is the Administrative. The mundane tedious work required to keep the machine running.
The pendulum swings, back and forth, in tune with life’s natural cycles. From Creative to Administrative, and back again.
When it swings far to one side, the other loses sharpness and feels neglected. This makes me nervous, since I know I have to use both sides to build momentum. I’m afraid I’m going to lose whatever side I’m not working on.
But that’s all in my head – the swings from the Creative and the Administrative are normal. And those swings are required to generate momentum.
For me it goes something like this:
Life gives me a new problem. A new level in the video game. Could be moving to a new city. Could be a career change, or a big project. Or it could be finding a life partner, and starting a family. Or getting older and trying to maintain vitality. Throughout life’s arc, there’s always a new challenge at each level.
When a new level starts, I need the Creative. I need my wits, and to apply my perspective from past experience. I need to openly question what I want the future to look like, and how I’m going to feel within it. I need my imagination, and my ability to dream.
So I go into my creative artist’s layer, and I paint the painting. Or write the song. Or book. Or sketch. I get into a flow state and visualize. I create something new, something that feels like me, like it’s coming from deep inside.
My inner creative artist puts my vision on a page – or canvas, or recording (choose your medium).
Then the Administrative takes over. The pendulum swings from imagination to execution. I map out a plan. I make lists. I take action.
This is the day to day grind. The robot-like consistency. The training; the practice. It’s sometimes boring and repetitive.
The Administrative is where skill development happens. And those skills help me gather speed and overtake the challenges. The Administrative requires consistency.
And, then… I break through. I defeat the dragon at the end of the level. I find the hidden token. The background music changes in the video game, and I progress to the next level.
At that point, the Creative and the Administrative have merged to give me ninja-like powers, and I use them to take the final steps and conquer that particular set of challenges.
But as natural as the sun setting, new challenges emerge.
Time to go back to the Creative. Back to the artist’s studio. Time to conjure up another vision, and ideate a new plan. The process starts all over again.
And on and on it goes, the internal tug of war between the Creative and the Administrative – both required for personal forward momentum.