The Practical Guide on How to Stay Creative While Traveling

Freelancers now make up 34% of the workforce in the United States. This statistic is expected to bloom to over 50% by 2020 with freelancers, independent workers, and entrepreneurs predicted to be the majority of laborers in the market.

The key to thriving in this environment?

A relentless bias toward repeatable creativity.

In a 2010 global study, IBM identified creativity as the most important factor for success. From corporate roles down to the coffee-shop freelancer, creativity is the backbone skill in the landscape of work today.

But the flexibility offered to a freelancer in the form of freedom can bring about its own problems.

As our professional lives morph into a more nomadic, digital and fluid lifestyle, we have more responsibility for our creativity and productivity. Nobody is looking over our shoulder or structuring our work for us.

As the saying goes — “with freedom comes responsibility.”

This freedom extends to travel; our client pool is often scattered worldwide rather than limited to a local area. If you are connected, you can be operational. Travel brings some specific challenges to creative work.

I’m a content manager and freelance copywriter, and as a frequent traveler, I’ve developed a set of strategies to keep me creative, productive and healthy while I’m traveling. If you’re a freelance creative, entrepreneur or independent worker, these methods can act as a launch pad to make them your own.

Hot bath or shower before bedtime

My day of travel really starts with good sleep the night before.

Typically I’m on the road with my wife, and travel days seem to get away from me faster than a day at home does. So I make it my goal to get up 60–90 minutes earlier than usual. This grants me access to what I call the “Magic Time.”

The Magic Time for me is when I experience the silence of the morning — when the birds aren’t even singing yet. A runner or two may pass by on the street, but other than that, there are minimal distractions.

To get up earlier, however, I need a solid nighttime routine the evening before. In order to get up earlier without compromising cognitive health due to less sleep, you’ve got to also go to bed earlier.

One easy way to do this is to take a bath or shower before bed. When our body temperature drops rapidly after a warm bath, it slows a handful of metabolic functions like heart rate, breathing, and digestion. It slides us into relaxation and help us prep our bodies and minds for sleep.

If you want to take this strategy all the way, do these two additional things:

Turn the thermostat to 60–65 degrees before you get in the bath or shower (or set the air conditioner if it’s available).
Throw in 1 cup of epsom salt into your bath. The magnesium will be absorbed topically and can do wonders for nervous system relaxation.

Supplements

I always pack a stack of supplements to stay on my routine. Over the years, I’ve noticed how my physiology (which is impacted by what I put in my mouth) has a great impact on repeatable creativity.

These aren’t for everyone; you want to consult your doctor before trying any supplement. But I’ll list them here so you can do further research if any sound promising for your situation.

Onnit Alpha Brain: I really enjoy this nootropic in the afternoon when I need to dial in my memory focus. The upside to this supplement is that it’s caffeine free so it doesn’t disrupt my sleep pattern.
Onnit Shroom Tech Support: I like taking Onnit Shroom Tech Support about a half-hour before I train. The cordyceps in this supplement have been shown to increase oxygen utilization, aerobic capacity, and cellular energy.
Orgain Superfood: I’ve gone though many superfood blends but right now, I’m using Orgain Superfoods. The nutrient profile is impressive and I’m especially in favor of the 7g of fiber per serving. The taste is not offensive either. I take this first thing in the morning.
Rise Protein Bars: I make sure to have a handful of bars during my stay to fill in the gaps or graze when I’m in deep work. The spike and dip in blood-glucose from waiting too long to eat or eating too much after you’ve waited too long is a dagger to creative work. My favorite flavors are the Lemon Cashew and Chocolatey Coconut.

Intentional breathing

When I’m on the road, it seems like the days become shorter. The change in environment causes an influx of interesting distractions. My wife and I do things together that we normally don’t do on a “normal” day. I want to see the town. I want to go to the local cafe and participate in the culture. I want to go to the downtown park and sit on a bench.

I also get a surge of creativity that needs to be channeled. But I need to workout at some point in the day or else I get off-track. And remember, I have to fulfill my responsibilities with work.

Sometimes it’s like I can feel the smoke swirling from my ears due to the fatigue of the brain!

A simple tool to reign in the mental circus is intentional breathing. The reason why this is a bedrock habit for creative professionals is largely due to the impact it has on our vagal tone.

The vagus nerve has multiple entry points that diverge from two stems rooted in the cerebellum and brainstem that wander to the lowest viscera of your abdomen, touching your heart and most major organs along the way. This nerve is all over the place.

The vagus nerve is also the command center for our sympathetic nervous system — the system responsible for helping slow our heart rate, blood pressure and downshift organ function.

The vagus nerve, when stimulated with intentional breathing, is also responsible for the production of “Vagusstoff,” a term coined by German physiologist, Otto Loewi. Vagusstoff was later discovered as a neurotransmitter called acetylcholine — which is assists in the formation of our memory, verbal, and logical reasoning, as well as the ability to concentrate.

Here’s the upshot:

When you practice intentional breathing, you increase your mental acuity while lowering performance anxiety.

I like to use the 4–7–8 breathing technique created by Dr. Weil. It’s a practical way to heighten vagal tone when you feel scattered but need to focus. Here’s the simple framework.

To start, exhale completely through your mouth. Really empty yourself of breath.
Close your mouth and inhale quietly through your nose to a mental count of four.
Hold your breath for a seven count.
Exhale completely through your mouth audibly to a mental count of eight.
This is one breath. Now inhale again and repeat the cycle three more times for a total of four breaths.

The 90-minute block method

I like to do my creative work in sprints. On normal days, I usually get three five 90-minute blocks completed. When I’m on the road, it’s more like one or two 90-minute blocks.

This 90-minutes is doable and realistic when you’re traveling. Instead of looking at 6 hours of work in the eye, chunking it down to 90 minute sprints is a mental reprieve. The second reason I use the 90-minute block is because it comes up in some interesting research around the concept of “deep work.”

Tony Schwartz, author of Be Excellent at Anything, highlights the importance of ultradian rhythms in his work saying this:

The human body is hard-wired to pulse. To operate at our best, we need to renew our energy at 90-minute intervals — not just physically, but also mentally and emotionally.

More than 50 years ago, the pioneering sleep researcher Nathan Kleitman discovered something he named the “basic rest-activity cycle” — the 90 minute periods at night during which we move progressively through five stages of sleep, from light to deep, and then out again.

Although it’s much less well known, Kleitman also observed that our bodies operate by the same 90 minute rhythm during the day. When we’re awake, the movement is from higher to lower alertness. Other researchers have called this our “ultradian rhythm.”

The takeaway is this: By orienting ourselves to do our most complex and creative work in concentrated time blocks, we leverage our natural ultradian rhythm. The result is better work in less time.

Building renewal into these deep work blocks is critical. When we hunker down and ignore signals of fatigue — restlessness, hunger, clouded thinking, irritability — work quality and quantity drops. After 90 minutes, it’s important to find renewal — eat a meal, go for a run, phone a friend.

The makers of DeskTime, a productivity app that tracks computer use, analyzed user data that revealed the behavior of the most productive workers. The highest performing 10 percent tended to work in this fashion: periods of intense work followed by intermittent renewal.

The beauty of the 90-minute block method is that it can be used regardless if you’re on the road, at home, or in an office.

Maximizing creativity after exercising

I try to have one of my 90-minute blocks immediately after my workout. Exercise has this magical ability to catapult me into creative mode after the training session.

In fact, research shows that this creative window lasts up to two hours after the workout. The best part is that this affect is independent of my mood before exercising. Translation: if I’m in a funk, I go move.

Consider AirBnB Versus a Hotel

This is a nuance of how I like to travel — it doesn’t work for everyone.

I prefer to stay in an AirBnB over hotels. The luxury of a hotel is wonderful. However, I’ve developed a nose for AirBnB properties for one reason: the impact it has on my creativity.

Multicultural learning experiences facilitate creativity and cognitive flexibility.

I remember the time my wife and I stayed at a resort in Jamaica. It was beautiful. But I couldn't tell if I was in Malibu, California, Phoenix, Arizona, or Miami, Florida.

When we stay in an AirBnB, though, we get to engage with the homeowner and local crowd. We are immersed in the culture — and it’s usually very different from what we’re used to. It’s a purposeful attempt to pull us out of our comfortable, cultural bubble and discover that amongst differences, people are generally kind.

This stimulation goes beyond creativity — it produces a hope in humanity too.

Whatever you do now, chances are, your work will change in a number of ways: you’ll be called upon to work more independently and creatively than ever before. That may well include more travel. I hope some of these tips help you handle some of the nuances of doing your best creative work even while on the road.