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Hey there, innovation champions!
Have you ever found yourself completely stuck on a project, feeling like your creative well has run dry?
I still remember the sickening feeling in my stomach when I got my very first art commission. After the initial excitement wore off, panic set in. I seriously contemplated calling the client to cancel the contract and return their deposit.
Who was I kidding? I had no idea how to bring their vision to life!
This pattern repeated itself countless times throughout my 15-year career as a professional artist. And it still happens today with every workshop I design, every keynote I write, and every song I compose.
The cycle looks something like this:
Initial Excitement: “This is going to be amazing!”
Crushing Self-Doubt: “What was I thinking? I’ll never figure this out!”
The Messy Middle: “I have no idea what I’m doing, but I’ll keep trying…”
Breakthrough: “Wait… I think this is actually working!”
Completion: “I can’t believe I ever doubted this would come together!”
Here’s a little visual that, while tongue-in-cheek, captures the journey perfectly:
What I’ve discovered is that this cycle isn’t a bug in the creative process—it’s a feature. The very discomfort of pushing through those moments of doubt and confusion is exactly where the most innovative solutions emerge.
The Universal Innovation Renewal Cycle
What fascinates me is that this pattern isn’t unique to art. I see the exact same cycle in the tech teams I work with, whether they’re developing new products, solving complex engineering problems, or reimagining their business models.
Innovation isn’t a straight line. It’s a series of expansions and contractions, of flow states followed by plateaus.
The problem? Most of us aren’t prepared for the inevitable plateaus. We interpret them as failure, as evidence that we’ve “lost our touch” or that our initial idea wasn’t good enough.
But what if these plateaus are actually an essential part of the renewal cycle? What if they’re not obstacles to innovation, but doorways to deeper creativity?
Let me break this down using my Create the Impossible™ framework:
Play Hard: Embracing the Plateau
The first element of my framework is “Play Hard”—approaching challenges with a spirit of curiosity and exploration.
When you hit a creative plateau, your instinct might be to push harder in the same direction. To double down on what’s worked before. But that’s like trying to force your way through a brick wall.
Instead, what if you treated the plateau as an invitation to play in a different space? To explore tangential ideas, experiment with new approaches, or simply give yourself permission to wander?
I discovered this by accident during a particularly frustrating art commission. After days of getting nowhere, I put my “real” project aside and started doodling absurd, impossible designs just for fun. No pressure, no expectations—just pure play.
The breakthrough for my actual project came during this playful detour, emerging from a connection I never would have made if I’d kept banging my head against the same wall.
This is why play isn’t just fun—it’s functionally crucial for breaking through creative plateaus.
Make Crap: The Power of Productive Failure
The second element of my framework is “Make Crap”—giving yourself permission to create imperfect first attempts.
Creative plateaus often stem from perfectionism. We get stuck because we’re afraid to make something bad, to fail publicly, to shatter the illusion of competence we’ve worked so hard to maintain.
But every master artist knows the secret: you have to make a lot of bad art to get to the good stuff.
When I was teaching calligraphy, I would tell my students they had 500 bad alphabets in them that they needed to get out before the good ones would start flowing. This wasn’t to discourage them, but to liberate them—to give them permission to make those necessary “bad” attempts without judging themselves.
In tech innovation, we call this “failing fast” or “rapid prototyping.” But too often, companies adopt the terminology without embracing the underlying mindset. They still expect each iteration to be better than the last, leading to risk aversion and incremental thinking.
True innovation requires genuine comfort with productive failure—with making something truly crappy as a stepping stone to discovery.
Learn Fast: Finding the Pattern
The third element of my framework is “Learn Fast”—extracting insights from every experience, especially the challenging ones.
Creative plateaus are rich with information if we know how to read them. They’re telling us something important about our approach, our assumptions, or our process.
When I’m stuck in a creative project, I now ask myself:
- What pattern am I repeating that’s no longer serving me?
- What assumption am I making that might be limiting my options?
- What am I avoiding because it feels uncomfortable or unfamiliar?
These questions often reveal that the plateau isn’t a sign of failure—it’s a signal that I’ve outgrown my current approach and need to evolve.
In one particularly challenging art commission, I realized I had been trying to force a technique that had worked perfectly in previous pieces but wasn’t right for this new context. The plateau was simply my creative instinct telling me to try something different.
Breaking Through Your Next Plateau
So how can you apply these insights to your own creative cycles, whether you’re developing software, leading a team, or solving complex business problems?
Here are three practical strategies that have helped me and the teams I work with:
- Schedule Strategic Detours: When you hit a plateau, don’t just push harder in the same direction. Deliberately schedule time to explore adjacent spaces. If you’re stuck on a coding problem, try sketching it visually. If your product strategy feels stale, study an entirely different industry for inspiration.
- Create Low-Stakes Experiments: Designate specific projects or time blocks where “failure” is not just allowed but expected. Google’s famous 20% time worked precisely because it created a space where the pressure to succeed was removed, allowing true innovation to emerge.
- Document Your Cycles: Start tracking your creative cycles. Note when you enter a plateau and what ultimately helps you break through. Over time, you’ll start to see patterns that can help you navigate future plateaus more effectively.
Remember, every great innovator from Einstein to Jobs experienced these same cycles of expansion and contraction. The difference isn’t that they avoided plateaus—it’s that they learned to recognize them as a natural and necessary part of the creative process.
The plateau isn’t your enemy. It’s the silent partner in your innovation journey, forcing you to question your assumptions, explore new territories, and ultimately break through to solutions you could never have planned in advance.
So the next time you feel stuck, remember: you’re not failing at creativity. You’re simply in a renewing phase of the cycle. Embrace it, play with it, learn from it—and watch as the breakthrough emerges when you least expect it.
Stay curious, stay playful, and keep creating the impossible!
I’d love to hear from you. What’s your go-to strategy when you hit a creative plateau? Click here to share your story!
Senior Leaders: Ready to help your team navigate creative plateaus more effectively? Book a complimentary Innovation Strategy Session and let’s explore how the Create the Impossible™ framework can transform your team’s approach to innovation cycles.
