Coaching practices for Follow Your Interest Creativity

Describe almost anything you are working through and IX Coach finds the practices whose real-world fit is closest. For Follow Your Interest Creativity, these are the strongest matches in the current practice library.

Does this sound like the set of challenges you might be facing?

• I keep choosing projects based on what I think will impress people or do well, and then I stall out halfway through because deep down they never actually moved me
• Even when I make time for myself I pick something "worthwhile"
• I feel like I should already know my one thing and lock in, but honestly I’ve barely tried anything
• Everything I make now has to justify itself
• My interest in this was strong while it was new and intellectually shiny, and now that the novelty’s worn off it’s fizzling

Practices that may help

1. Follow genuine interest, not strategic interest
   Pursue the thing that genuinely excites you — even if you cannot explain why or see how it fits.
   The Creative Act: Rick Rubin’s Approach to Making
2. Choose low-agenda, high-curiosity destinations
   Pick somewhere that interests your inner child, not somewhere impressive — curiosity, not accomplishment, is the fuel.
   The Artist Date, Made Practical
3. Sample widely before committing to a niche
   Premature specialization forecloses interests you haven’t discovered yet.
   Passion vs Interest: How to Actually Find Work You Love
4. Passion vs Interest: How to Actually Find Work You Love
   Paul O’Keefe and colleagues found that people who believe interests are fixed ("find your passion") tend to abandon pursuits when they get hard, while those who see interests as developed through effort stay curious and persistent. The evidence suggests "follow your passion" is not just unhelpful advice — it may actively discourage the effort that transforms shallow interest into deep, sustaining work.
5. Keep side projects and play
   Protect a low-stakes project with no goal — the “waste” is where the real ideas surface.
   Steal Like an Artist, in Practice
6. Link developing interests to a sense of contribution
   Interest that connects to helping others or solving real problems becomes more sustaining than interest that is purely self-contained.
   Passion vs Interest: How to Actually Find Work You Love
7. Prioritize skill gains that reveal more of the domain
   Each layer of skill opens new parts of a domain you couldn’t see before — this is how interest deepens.
   Passion vs Interest: How to Actually Find Work You Love
8. Invest effort before expecting the passion to arrive
   Passion follows competence — start before you feel ready, because the feeling comes after.
   Passion vs Interest: How to Actually Find Work You Love
9. Develop interest in areas where it is currently absent
   Interest is not fixed — it can be cultivated through basic understanding and early success experiences.
   Expectancy-Value Theory: Why You Try (or Don’t)
10. Quantity first: generate the most ideas possible before evaluating any
    The best way to have a good idea is to have many ideas — originality rises with volume, so generate recklessly before selecting.
    The Beginner’s Mind in Creative Practice

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