Time and Achievement

I love reading the schedules well-known creative people have written down over time; I then try to find similarities and patterns to their life and work balances.  Some types of jobs and lives lend themselves to more routine habits, others seem random and chaotic, yet produce results.  Below is a sampling of schedules, quotes about work habits, etc.  Looking at them, several things become apparent:

• Achievements are not the result of luck - quite the opposite in many cases.  Creative people often face the worst kind of misfortunes - poverty, illnesses, personal tragedy, and yet keep producing.  Work as therapy?  Maybe.  Uncontrollable compulsion to create?  Probably, to some degree.  But all extend effort in the service of their art, and that means...
• Sacrifices must be made - Most, if not all, creative endeavors are solo endeavors.  Even in so-called teamwork, there's usually individuals creating individually and then stitching together the pieces collectively.  Not in all cases, of course, but generally speaking it seems creation and solitude go together.  Therefore, there has to be a sacrifice of time, interactions with friends, and other possibilities.  

Let's see how others do it:

Ben Franklin's Daily Schedule (From the Beanstalk Foundation.org):

Ben's schedule seems congenial enough, but an analysis reveals just how much time Ben devoted to effort, if not literal work.  The Work columns add up to eight hours, and then there are subtle things that indicate additional activity:  "prosecute the the present study," is not the same as chill in front of the TV,  and a two-hour lunch seems pretty sweet, until you realize "overlook my accounts" is not usually conducive to a worry-free meal.  For hours in the evening for "Supper. Music or diversion, or conversation." sound relaxing enough.  What does "Put things in their places" include?  It also seems as if "Examination of the day," is going to involve some mental effort, so maybe Ben's free time isn't as free as we might think.  Seven hours of sleep and right back at it.

RJ Andrews at Info We Trust, applied his engineering talents to create an interesting "wheel of time" diagram showing how a sample of creative people use their time.  First, the key, or legend, to the diagrams:

How it works:

Here's a larger diagram showing a large selection of creative people going about their daily routines.

Andrews' conclusions from his work:

Comparing the routines of these creatives is fascinating. Some work in the early morning, some work better late at night. Many begin their day with coffee and use tobacco and alcohol. Considering that our modern concept of exercise was not developed until the mid-20th century, it is fascinating how many of these people spent their afternoons taking vigorous walks.

There are hundreds, maybe thousands, more.  Probably the main point to leave with is there is not a magic time, place, or situation in which to be creative.  Perfectionists such as myself must always battle the desire to wait until everything in our lives line up like some mystical formation of stars and planets before beginning some great effort.  It's creation that forms the schedule, not the other way around.  E.B. White (from the great site Brain Pickings) said it best:

A writer who waits for ideal conditions under which to work will die without putting a word on paper.