Every new notebook I’ve ever owned has ten perfect pages. Then there’s a gap of a few days, a half-scrawled note with good intentions, a couple more days with some random chicken scratch and then 90 blank pages waiting to be used. The new brilliant notebook system I was using completely abandoned, and finally the notebook goes to join its ancestors in a random drawer somewhere—never to be seen again. I used to think this was a failure. That I somehow didn’t design the system right or I didn’t have enough “willpower” to make it work for me. But that strong start wasn’t just some sort of accident. In the beginning, my brain is getting dopamine from the exciting newness of a fresh notebook. I didn’t have to will myself into doing anything, the “newness” was doing all the work. Most people treat this burst of activity as a problem because it eventually fades. But I’ve start to treat is more as a tool. Like it’s a known fact about how my brain works. Unlike interest, novelty can be manufactured on demand. Why do you think people with ADHD are often so creative? We’re leaning into that novelty that moves our brains into action. I call this Create (one of the 4 Cs of Motivation), and it’s a useful tool for making boring tasks feel new and exciting. Here are some strategies for using Create:
When the novelty fades (because it always, always will), that doesn’t mean the method or strategy failed. It’s expected, that’s the nature of novelty. So mix up the scenery, invent a new strategy, or start something new again. Novelty is a renewable resource! It just has a short shelf life, so you need to flex your creativity and restock often. This week’s worksheet: Manufacture Some New. Restock novelty when a task or strategy starts to go stale.
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