To The Point … Go take a shower. || Copywriting ideas for photographers
To The Point is a video series where I share copywriting ideas for photographers, posted to my Instagram account . It’s just a quick tip to make your copy better in less than 60 seconds. These blog posts are a little more in-depth, to really dig into those ideas. If you would rather watch the short video, scroll to the bottom of this post.
“What does showering have to do with copywriting Rachel?”
Um, basically everything.
Usually when people tell me that they don’t know what to write, it’s because all they are doing is sitting there thinking about what to write. But good ideas come from participating in life, not from waiting for life to happen to you. Your computer or phone is not an inspiring piece of technology. But the conversations you have and the places you go and the events you attend are all FULL of inspiration.
But after all that life-living, our brain needs a break. It needs down time to process everything we’ve lived, experienced, and thought. If it doesn’t get it, our experiences don’t carry much longevity or meaning. (I should note that this down time and decompressing is extremely difficult for me and does NOT come naturally.)
Enter: the shower.
Have you ever heard people talking about how they get their best ideas in the shower? People have written entire books about this concept. But here’s a short article so you get the gist.
For you, it might not be the shower that brings on these revelations. But I bet it’s something similarly mundane: driving a familiar route in your car, going a walk in your neighborhood, brushing your teeth, etc. When we perform tasks that we don’t have to think about too much, our brain reaches a state of rest. And it’s in that rest that we find inspiration. It’s like our brain is saying all day long: IF YOU JUST GIVE ME A SECOND TO DO NOTHING ELSE, I PROMISE I WILL DELIVER THE GOODS.
I am definitely one of those people who has their best ideas in the shower. And I have the waterproof notebook to prove it. (Yes, I literally keep that notebook and a pencil in my shower for when the ideas come to me.)
Listen, I love music. I love podcasts. I love TV, and books, and movies, and social media. But too much of these good things absolutely hinders my creativity. If all we do is spend time listening to other people’s ideas, how can we expect ourselves to have any of our own?
So if you’re feeling stuck, do something simple. Turn off all the noise (everyone else’s thoughts too). For me, this is getting in the shower. It’s going through the motions of something I’ve done thousands of times in my life so my brain gets the break it’s been asking me for. And usually, that’s when the magic happens.
P.S. Here’s an easy way to implement this immediately and make your copy better TODAY …
… pick a task that you’re already planning on doing today that takes little to no brain energy. Taking a shower, doing dishes, folding laundry, going for a walk. But whatever it is, set an intention for that time. Choose an idea or concept you want to think through and give yourself those minutes, while you perform that task, to think about it. (If you have a great idea or thought, please email me. I wanna hear about it!)