On letting go of creative control + finding creative freedom

Since starting The Rebel Rousers (originally That Hummingbird Life) in 2014, I’ve done pretty much everything myself. From teaching myself design and back-end tech stuff to podcast editing and marketing, I’ve been a one woman band. If something needed doing, I taught myself and found a way (like so many of us do) and figured it out as I went.

And I know I’m not alone. For so many of, we’re a one woman band, if not an orchestra. As multi-passionates, there’s so much of it we love, learning about new things, having a whole array of creative things to switch between so you’re never bored, and an endless amount of rabbit holes to go down.

But for all the great bits, there’s a not so wonderful downside:

Along the way, because we’re doing everything ourselves, doing everything ends up being a hill we’re willing to die on. We end up buying into this myth that all of these tasks can be done by yours truly only, and let’s face it, it can be really fucking overwhelming.

As a multi-passionate, we enjoy doing all the things. But as humans, we can’t do all the things.

There are so many reasons we take everything on ourselves; necessity/lack of resources to do otherwise, because we can see our vision and feel the need to execute every task and needing to have creative control.

I think when you have done everything yourself, it can feel incredibly hard to give up creative control. Since starting my redesign and overhaul of my business last year, I really came face to face with just how important creative control was to me. And honestly? What a problem it has become.

When faced with the task of a rebrand, I felt genuinely sick to my stomach. I knew how much it would entail, how many micro-tasks sat behind every little task, and it was daunting, to say the least.

But as I started designing, I knew I needed an outside perspective or two to help me bring my vision to life. The idea of bringing someone else in, however, felt seriously scary. And vulnerable.

I knew no matter who I worked with, my expectations would be high, probably too high.

I also knew that it would involve bringing someone into my own behind the scenes and creative process, which is messy at the best of times and felt uncomfortable. And I also knew I’d have to give really honest feedback. And as someone who has really struggled to find people who ‘get me’ and what I do, I was also prepared for an uphill battle, to have to explain my business in ten different ways and fight to keep it out of a rigid box.

As I was starting the redesign, I was chatting to one of my coaching clients, and now dear friend, Stak from Bold and cat about just how sick it was all making me feel. I was showing her different fonts, colour combinations, and during one of our friend chats, she off the cuff created a mood board from my Pinterest board, helped me come up with tone words and just got it.

Around this time, she was starting her website design business for creatives doing interesting things online and asked me if I’d be up for her designing or helping me redesign my new website. I politely declined. The idea of someone else doing it? While I realised I was in quite the pickle doing it all myself - well it just felt too scary and out of my comfort zone giving up creative control.

I was more worried about my end of things than hers - being a nightmare client, being picky, and. never being happy unless I did it myself (come on, we all struggle with this one!).

And I was worried about needing to be honest enough to end up with something I was ecstatic about, not just agreeing to something because of my being a recovering people pleaser.

Over the next weeks, Stak hinted a couple of times about wanting to do some mock ups and told me that there was absolutely no pressure to keep anything of what she did. It was her emphasis on the collaboration element of it and being able to be truly honest that did it.

I realised that here was someone who is not only brilliant at what they do, but could speak about my vision as if she was in my own head, and also understood the creative control piece, didn’t push me or insert her ego into any part of it.

So, with trepidation on my part and a shitload of excitement on Stak’s part, we hashed out some terms and got started. It was to be a genuine collaboration, honesty was the first policy and it was time to give up some creative control.

it was bloody eye opening.

I think sometimes reading these things, it can be a bit ‘happily ever after’, but I can say with my hand on heart, this was one of those rare times. The end result is something I never could have dreamt up alone, and I couldn’t have dreamt of in general.

And while to begin with it was vulnerable, it was scary and out of my comfort zone, other things soon took place of those. It wasn’t long before I found myself thoroughly enjoying a the creative collaboration, bouncing ideas around, and enjoying having a sparring partner.

I actually came to really, really love the process.

I loved receiving the mocks ups, the back and forth of revisions and changes and bringing everything together. Having someone else involved meant I became a lot less self-critical, could be more objective and things could actually move forward. And having someone else who got it? Well that changed everything. As creative and multi-passionates, we’re so often told to put ourselves in a box, but the fact that Stak was all in on the bright colours and the patterns and didn’t ever try to make me do something more on trend or minimal, well it was a game changer.

Stak met me exactly where I was and encouraged me to bring out all of me, and truly brought out the best in me, and I know I couldn’t have done that on my own. And, well that was revolutionary.

Stak created an environment where I could be as hands on or hands off as I needed to be. At the start of the process I told her I couldn’t imagine her implementing the changes on my website because I wouldn’t be able to give up creative control. But by the time we got there, my thoughts had completely shifted.

As someone who preaches about the need for people to work in their own zone of genius, it was time to practice what I preached, and I knew Stak could execute the vision a million times better than me. If I had done it on my own, I know for a fact that I would still be working on it, and I’d be seriously stressed.

I never could have imagined it, but giving up creative control? Well it felt a lot like freedom. And it was a huge fucking relief.

Aside from the fact that Stak is fucking brilliant at what she does, there is an important lesson to be had here.

And that’s why I’m sharing this with you today.

Handing over creative control, being a one woman band and feeing the pressure to learn all the things and do it yourself, it’s hard.

But sometimes, doing it yourself versus letting people in can literally be the difference between burning out and being able to continue. And I know which one I would choose every time.

So I want to leave you with some parting reminders about creative control.

Parting reminders

• While giving up creative control can feel seriously scary, on the other side of it, it can feel like a MASSIVE weight has been lifted off your shoulders.
  

• Be patient and don’t dull down what you do so it’s more understandable to others, because there will be people who get what you do. You might have to search harder to find them, but they do exist, and they’re worth wait.
  

• You don’t have to do it all on your own. Other people genuinely want to help, and creative collaboration can be so much fun.
  

• When you find the right person who compliments your approach and you come at it from a place of mutual respect, stop being stubborn and give a try. You never know, you might end up on the other side with something that exceeded your vision and something you could have only dreamt of.