The best days are those that start with fresh inspiration. It can be easy to roll straight from bed to your desk without so much as thinking about where you’re going or how you got there- it’s routine. I’ve found that browsing the internet for about 10-15 minutes prior to diving into work can be extremely cathartic. We live in a place where we are fortunate enough to have access to the internet which allows us to have literally googolplexes of information at our fingertips.
The brain, like any muscle in our body, needs to be exercised to stay fit. Spend at least 10 minutes a day taking in fresh inspiration whether through words or images, and try to learn at least one new thing before hitting your pillow at night. If you’re feeling overwhelmed with the vast amount of information available to you, try one of these inspiration-finding exercises:
1. Browse a go-to site. If you don’t feel like thinking about what to search for, try a site that does the searching for you. Once you’ve bookmarked a few of your favorites, news is easy to find. Some of my favorites are:
Design Taxi
http://designtaxi.com/
Storyline
http://storylineblog.com/
AdFreak
www.adfreak.com
Terrible Copywriter
http://terriblecopywriter.com/
Bing News
www.bing.com/news
Marie Claire/Work
http://www.marieclaire.com/career-money/
2. Word/Topic search. What are you interested in? Advertising? Politics? Cats? Underwater basket-weaving? Pick a word and plug it into a search engine or YouTube. Anything goes.
3. Talk to someone. I know this post is called the WOW of WWW but inspiration doesn’t have to come from a screen. Spend a few minutes talking to a colleague. What do they do on the weekends? Where did they work prior to this job? Why did they pick advertising? Do they have any hidden talents? Where did they buy their shoes? Are they a size 7? Learning about someone else’s life philosophy (even if it is as trivial as the philosophical thought process of a shoe purchase) can help inspire your life philosophy. You might come away with a better understanding of how to communicate with that person. And as my favorite student leadership director used to say, “Teamwork… makes the dream work.”
Sarah Matley
Account Services Coordinator
Mood: Inquisitive
