A lot of creatives say that when they are on an airplane – where you are required to turn your phone, socials and inboxes offline – they produce their best work. Right there in the clouds. Yes, for some it takes being in the clouds, feet off the ground and no chance to get a wifi connection to get to work, to get in the zone to be going places in your brain to push out something to be proud of.
I once read that there was a man who had a book deadline and saw no other way to get himself to sit down and write, but to book a round trip-airplane ticket.
He literally went for long connecting flights so that he was pushed to not distract himself. And when he got off the plane his book was done. He found wifi at his final destination airport and sent the draft version to the publisher for editing.
People usually think, when they hear of the detox I created, that I hate technology and that I would wish to go back to the times we lived in caves and bushes. Not true. And this story kinda captures what I always try to say about how I view my ideal relationship with technology.
Stay away from it to allow yourself to live life fully, to have all your senses activated, grounded, brain going from active to resting and to be able to produce your best work, whatever that looks like. And then when you need to send that key e-mail or print that design with a 3D printer, or record and publish that groundbreaking video, you’ll have everything you need right there.
Don’t get sucked into all that technology. It steals your attention from the real deal: You.
But before you have your real story to share, your deepest inspiration and purpose still to be found, don’t get sucked into all that technology that will just steal your attention from the real deal. Which is you, you are the real deal, not all the content you are consuming. And remember: when you are consuming content, you can’t be creating.
And if what you need to get started is a couple of hours on flight mode: do it. Don’t let anything stop you from letting your mission take off.
Rachida –