Why Most Creatives Stay Stuck (And How I Broke Out)
We’ve all had that moment: staring at a new skill we want to learn, a tool we want to master, or a craft we want to finally take seriously—only to feel completely paralyzed.
For me, it was learning how to write underlicks while I was juggling writing and coding. I had envisioned creating music with this new method, but every time I sat down, the overwhelm hit hard. Too many tutorials. Too many experts with “the only right way.” Too many distractions.
So, what did I do? I flailed. I spent weeks dabbling without progress. I downloaded courses I never finished. I tried jumping from GarageBand to Logic Pro to Logic Pro for iPad—never long enough to see results. I convinced myself that maybe I just wasn’t “talented enough.”
The truth? Talent wasn’t the problem. My problem was clarity. I had no repeatable system to guide me from idea → practice → results.
And that’s the reality for so many creatives. We don’t lack potential. We lack focus. We get stuck in the swamp of too many options and end up spinning instead of moving.
Here’s the good news: once I discovered how to cut through the noise—focusing on the right 20% of effort that actually drives results—everything changed. I went from dabbling to producing usable underlicks in weeks. More importantly, I regained my confidence.
If you’ve been circling a skill you know would unlock new possibilities, but you’re still stuck at square one, you’re not alone.
The question is: what skill have you been putting off because it feels too overwhelming? Hit reply and let me know—I’ll share how I’d approach it.
It’s really encouraging to hear that you flailed at first too. Sometimes people only share their wins and it makes the rest of us feel like we’re behind. But you’ve been real about the struggle. For me it’s about figuring how to turn the things I’m most passionate about (my art) into a steady income stream so that I can choose whether I want to be in a 9-5 anymore. Maybe not give it up entirely but have the freedom to choose. I learned in your ebook yesterday about needing a compass much more than a map to give myself direction and you’re really touching on this idea here. Thank you for all the inspiring and helpful content Idris Elijah!
You really showed me how much “comparison” has drowned out my voice in the past. It’s not that I can’t do it, it’s that I haven’t committed to one direction long enough. What you said makes so much sense because we are living in a double edged sword world of too many options and distractions. You’re quieting the noise around us with this perspective and I keep going back to the word “clarity”. Clarity is the key to direction. Thank you for starting my Monday morning on the right note Idris!