I ate the exact same lunch almost every day in high school.

– Two mini pizzas. A Capri Sun. Every single day.
– – I didn’t eat an apple until college.
– – – I still special-order almost everything.

Travel has never really been my thing either. I didn’t step onto an airplane until my freshman year of college, and even now, while I usually enjoy wherever I end up, I rarely think the packing, lines, noise, money, and general airport bonkers-ness were worth the trouble.

But music?

Completely different story.

I’ll jump from The Eagles to Snoop Dogg to Johnny Cash to Dave Brubeck in the span of twenty minutes without thinking twice. Old ads. Anime. Sitcoms. Weird YouTube documentaries at 1:00 in the morning. I could lose an entire weekend wandering through an art museum without looking at my phone once.

– Some parts of life, I want predictable.
– – Others, I want the exact opposite.

I’ve been thinking lately about how all of us “eat” the world differently.

Not food necessarily. Inputs.

– Experiences.
– – Ideas.
– – – – Art.
– – – Conversations.
– – Risk.
– Discomfort.

Some people travel to feel awake again.
Some people chase new restaurants.
Some people disappear into films or books or music.

The healthiest creative people I know have figured out what breaks their patterns.

That’s the important part.

– Not becoming a “foodie” or a world traveler or an art snob.
– – Just finding the thing that interrupts autopilot.
– – – Something that stretches the edges a little.
– – – – Something that makes your brain work differently for a minute.

For me, photography became that thing.

I got into it partly because I wasn’t sure I’d be good at it. Honestly, there are still days I’m not convinced. That uncertainty was part of the appeal. It forced me to pay attention differently.

Shooting with models did the same thing.

Illustration too.

I’ve had people tell me, very directly, that drawing wasn’t one of my gifts. They were probably right. But sometimes the point isn’t mastery. Sometimes the point is disruption.

A small rewiring.

A reminder that your default settings are not permanent.

Now, whenever I feel creatively stuck, I try to change the inputs before I change the work.

– Different music.
– – Different route home.
– – – Different camera.
– – – – Different conversation.
– – – – – Different chair in the coffee shop.

Tiny things.

But tiny things have a way of opening doors.

– – – Next time you get in the car, try changing the station. – – –

Pick a genre you think you hate.

Then look for one thing you like about it.

Not the whole song.

Just one thing.

– Maybe it’s the rhythm.
– – Maybe it’s the honesty.
– – – Maybe it’s the texture of the recording.
– – – – Maybe it’s the way the bass sits underneath everything like an old diesel engine idling at a stoplight.

Hold onto that part.

Then see if you can hear it again in the next song.
And the next.

Eventually you start noticing something interesting:

The world gets bigger when you stop demanding that it sound exactly like you.

And sometimes the thing you almost skipped becomes the thing that quietly changes your work.

Or changes you.

– – Even if only a little. – –

And honestly, a little is usually enough.