Creatures of habit: Daily rituals of great minds
Mason Currey’s incredibly rich blog Daily Routines is an interesting resource for English learners who want to practice reading while discovering the daily habits of famous creative people (writers, composers, painters, poets, philosophers, filmmakers, scientists…). The blog collects details from interviews, diaries, and letters to show how artists, writers, and thinkers organized their time.
It offers short, clear stories that are easy to follow. The language is mostly accessible, and you’ll pick up useful vocabulary related to routines, and daily activities. It’s a fun way to practice grammar as well (with a focus on present and past simple tenses) while learning how people like Stepehen King or Frida Kahlo structured their days. You could check if it is true that „great minds think alike“.
An intriguing section of the blog organises creatives based on their most defining habits:
Drinkers
Early-Risers
Exercisers
Nap Takers
Night Owls
Procrastinators
Smokers
Drug-users
Early-risers seem to be the most common type. The author of the blog also wrote a series of articles for slate.com and one of them is titled Is waking up early the secret to artistic success?
Early-risers seem to be the most common type. The author of the blog also wrote a series of articles and one of them is titled Is waking up early the secret to artistic success?
There he says that if there’s one key takeaway from his book, it’s this: start your day early and get straight to work. You can make a cup of coffee if you want, but avoid getting distracted by other tasks.
Use that early time before daily responsibilities begin to pile up.
Some people get up early out of necessity, but others find that there’s something special about that early-a.m. feeling. The Irish novelist and playwright Edna O’Brien works in the morning, she has said, “because one is nearer to the unconscious, the source of inspiration.”
The table below shows the different activities that make up the days of creatives, broken down into times (sleep, creative work, day job/administrative tasks, food and leisure, exercise, and other activities).
Click image to see the interactive version (via Podio).
You could interact with the infographic, keeping just sleep and food visible for example. This way you will be able to see who went (or still goes) to sleep early/late, who had naps during the day, is it the majority of people who did so or just a few, etc. You could think of your own questions to explore.
“There are certain things I do if I sit down to write,” he said. “I have a glass of water or a cup of tea. There’s a certain time I sit down, from 8:00 to 8:30, somewhere within that half hour every morning,” he explained.
“I have my vitamin pill and my music, sit in the same seat, and the papers are all arranged in the same places. The cumulative purpose of doing these things the same way every day seems to be a way of saying to the mind, you’re going to be dreaming soon.“
“It’s not any different than a bedtime routine,” he continued. “Do you go to bed a different way every night? Is there a certain side you sleep on? I mean I brush my teeth, I wash my hands. Why would anybody wash their hands before they go to bed? I don’t know. And the pillows are supposed to be pointed a certain way. The open side of the pillowcase is supposed to be pointed in toward the other side of the bed. I don’t know why.”
„Three times a week, Christo and Jeanne-Claude get shiatsu massages to keep them in good shape.
They listen exclusively to music by Mozart. It has become an unwritten law that whenever Christo and Jeanne-Claude appear, any music other than works by Mozart should be turned off. Mozart is played all day at Howard Street at a fairly low volume.
In the evening, if they go out or have guests, Christo shaves a second time and changes his clothes. At 7:30 P.M., there are often guests in the downstairs floor; Christo serves drinks. For a number of years now, dinners have taken place at a nearby restaurant. (…) They often have the doggy bags from the previous evening’s dinner. Jeanne-Claude hates to throw away food, as she dislikes wasting anything. After dinner, the legendary couple works for another hour or two.“
They are known for their collaborative works that involve the (frequently) large scale ‘wrapping’ of various objects; note the wrapped furniture behind them. (Photo by Fred W. McDarrah/Getty Images)
Another great collection of writers’ routines appears on The Marginalian website (it used to be called „Brain Pickings“). It is in fact one of the most frequently read and shared publications on the site: The Daily Routines of Great Writers
The author of children’s books E. B. White, who wrote Stuart Little says:
„I never listen to music when I’m working. I don’t have that kind of attentiveness, and I wouldn’t like it at all. On the other hand, I’m able to work fairly well among ordinary distractions. My house has a living room that is at the core of everything that goes on: it is a passageway to the cellar, to the kitchen, to the closet where the phone lives. There’s a lot of traffic. But it’s a bright, cheerful room, and I often use it as a room to write in, despite the carnival that is going on all around me. A girl pushing a carpet sweeper under my typewriter table has never annoyed me particularly, nor has it taken my mind off my work, unless the girl was unusually pretty or unusually clumsy. My wife, thank God, has never been protective of me, as, I am told, the wives of some writers are. In consequence, the members of my household never pay the slightest attention to my being a writing man — they make all the noise and fuss they want to. If I get sick of it, I have places I can go. A writer who waits for ideal conditions under which to work will die without putting a word on paper.“
So to recap, some reading resources related to the habits and daily routines of great creative minds include:
- Daily Routines Blog: how writers, artists, and other interesting people organize their days
- The Slate Series: articles by the author of the blog on topics like artists who drink crazy amounts of coffee
- The Daily Routines of Great Writers: quotes by famous writers about their habits and preferences
- The Daily Routines of Famous Creative People: an interactive infographic