Mornings in my world are spent teaching A/V classes to a bunch of bright-eyed teenagers in a rural high school that’s as small as it is full of character.

You might wonder what the scariest part of this routine is. For me, it’s the chill that runs down my spine when administrators grace the classroom with their presence for observation. But for the students? It’s the stark terror of facing the infinite possibilities of a blank screen (or page, but honestly, we rarely actually write anything).

Unleashing Creativity Despite Uncertainty

That blank canvas is a Pandora’s box for my young creatives, brimming with uncertainties. What should they create? Which idea is worth pursuing? How should they navigate the unfamiliar waters of writing, editing, or drawing? What if their efforts are a disaster? Or even worse, what if they succeed?

They’re paralyzed by the onslaught of questions, even after they’ve mustered the courage to put down those initial, tentative words.

Disarming the Fear of Imperfection

That’s the point when I drop my bombshell: I honestly couldn’t care less what they slap down on the page. Cue the incredulous stares, the silent questions about my sanity.

The toughest part of any creative endeavor isn’t finding the perfect phrase or the ideal shot — it’s igniting that spark of creation. It’s transforming the void of a blank page into something tangible.

The ‘Make a Pot’ Approach

I’ve spoken about this in my “make a pot” podcast, in which I advise my listeners to create something — anything — when inspiration is playing hard to get. Even if the result doesn’t set the world on fire, it’s a step in the right direction, a technically competent piece of work.

But for my students, that’s a tall order. They might lack even the most basic skills in video editing or scriptwriting, simply because they’ve never been taught before. So they can’t produce a solid, albeit uninspired, piece because they’re still wrestling with the fundamentals.

This is precisely why I encourage them to slap something — anything — onto that blank page. The moment you break that barrier, you’ve tackled the toughest part of creation. This isn’t to say it’s the end of creativity — it’s the beginning of a different kind of creative process.

With the first draft out of the way, it’s time to roll up your sleeves and dive into the sea of revision and editing. Believe me when I say editing is a breeze — we humans seem to be biologically engineered to criticize. Revision is simply identifying what’s not quite up to par and giving it a polish. Or, finding what sucks and making it suck less.

The Art of Editing and Fine-tuning

You keep at it. You adjust. You rearrange. You enhance. This is just editing — it’s no more and no less. You’ve already conjured something into existence, and now you’re just fine-tuning it. Take as many swings at it as you need.

Trust me on this: the moment you transform that blank page into just a page, you’ve climbed the steepest part of the mountain. From there, it’s a leisurely stroll through revision land.