EPISODE · Jun 6, 2026 · 9 MIN
Reclaim Your Creative Intuition
from Keep the Flow
The more experience I got as a jazz drummer, the worse my instincts became – and figuring out why changed how I think about every creative decision.There's a moment in almost every creative project where the variables multiply past what you can reasonably think through – and the harder you try to decide, the less clear it gets. I know this feeling from the bandstand: I'm a jazz drummer, and for a stretch of my 30s I lost access to the one thing I'd always been able to rely on – my improvisational instincts. I couldn't explain it, and reaching for more information made it worse. In this episode I talk about an essay by an anesthesiologist who went through the same thing, what his experience revealed about how creative intuition actually works, and the simple technique I developed to get my instincts back – one that turns out to apply far beyond drumming.🎧Check out my music: https://scottmclemore.bandcamp.com/🤟Join the Patreon community: https://patreon.com/scottmclemore📭 The free newsletter goes deeper into ideas like these: https://ktfpod.com Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
What this episode covers
The more experience I got as a jazz drummer, the worse my instincts became – and figuring out why changed how I think about every creative decision.There's a moment in almost every creative project where the variables multiply past what you can reasonably think through – and the harder you try to decide, the less clear it gets. I know this feeling from the bandstand: I'm a jazz drummer, and for a stretch of my 30s I lost access to the one thing I'd always been able to rely on – my improvisational instincts. I couldn't explain it, and reaching for more information made it worse. In this episode I talk about an essay by an anesthesiologist who went through the same thing, what his experience revealed about how creative intuition actually works, and the simple technique I developed to get my instincts back – one that turns out to apply far beyond drumming.🎧Check out my music: https://scottmclemore.bandcamp.com/🤟Join the Patreon community: https://patreon.com/scottmclemore📭 The free newsletter goes deeper into ideas like these: https://ktfpod.com Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
NOW PLAYING
Reclaim Your Creative Intuition
No transcript for this episode yet
Similar Episodes
Mar 26, 2026 ·1m
Mar 19, 2026 ·34m
Feb 18, 2026 ·11m
Feb 11, 2026 ·45m