Consistently retire old, successful material to create room for new ideas, preventing stagnation and fostering continuous creative evolution. This practice helps your brain generate novel content and avoids becoming a ‘one-hit wonder’ in your craft.
Embrace the risk of failure in ‘workout’ or practice sessions to develop truly good new material. Elite performers understand that ’eating shit’ is necessary to train and get stronger in their craft.
Be willing to let go of past successes and identities to remain present and future-oriented in your craft. This mindset prevents being constrained by former achievements and encourages continuous evolution.
Acknowledge and express your dark thoughts through creative outlets like writing, painting, or comedy, rather than suppressing them. This serves as a healthier channel for human darkness and can lead to impactful art.
Begin your day with a hard workout to trigger the release of adrenaline, dopamine, and norepinephrine, waking up your brain and body. This neurochemical shift enhances alertness and focus for up to six hours, making it easier to tackle demanding tasks.
Approach performances with an open, inviting, and vulnerable mindset to connect more deeply with your audience. This unspoken courage makes the audience more receptive, leading to better engagement and stronger positive reactions.
Aim to be your true off-stage self when performing, as this is the ultimate goal for a comedian. Conveying your genuine perspective on stage allows the audience to understand and appreciate your unique humor.
Maintain a state of receptiveness, like having your ‘antenna up,’ to continuously find creative ideas in daily life. This puts your brain in a mode where it’s always looking for humorous or insightful perspectives.
Spend time with other creative individuals to naturally shift your brain into a more creative or ‘joke mode.’ The company you keep can significantly influence your mindset and idea generation.
Take the ‘kernel’ of a creative idea directly to the stage or performance setting to build it out in real time. This iterative process allows for immediate feedback and organic development of material.
Continuously test and adjust your content, experimenting with different information levels and joke lines. Trim any ‘fat’ or useless information that doesn’t contribute to the humor or story to improve its effectiveness.
Be willing to let go of creative ideas or bits that consistently fail to land with an audience, even if you are personally attached to them. Recognizing when something ‘just doesn’t work’ is crucial for progress.
Adopt a playful, childlike mindset backstage before a performance to foster a fun and effective on-stage presence. This ‘goofing off’ helps you be the best version of yourself as a performer.
Understand that you cannot dictate how people will react to your content, and avoid complaining about negative feedback. Professionalism involves accepting that some material will land well, and some will not.
Do not ignore obvious disruptions or events in the audience, such as a fight or someone screaming, during a performance. Acknowledging these events maintains your connection with the audience and prevents appearing disconnected.
Adjust the angle or perspective of your content to make it more palatable or impactful for a specific audience. For example, a comedian can ‘shit on women harder’ if they are a woman, as it comes from an ‘own’ perspective.
Cultivate strong feelings (either love or hate) about topics, as indifference (‘I’m fine’) is generally not conducive to humor. Funny content often stems from passionate reactions to the world.
Organize your performance with brief, single-word cues for different segments, often broken into 15-minute chunks. This allows for flow and improvisation while keeping the structure of your show intact.
Utilize cannabis in specific, non-overwhelming doses to encourage stream-of-consciousness idea generation, recording these thoughts as voice memos. This can lead to new perspectives and humorous insights.
Discover new material by observing and riffing on topics during everyday discussions with others. If something naturally makes people laugh in conversation, it’s a good candidate for stage material.
Place your phone outside the bedroom while you sleep to improve sleep quality. Your brain anticipates picking up the phone even while sleeping, and its absence can lead to better rest.
Remove your phone from the room during cognitive tasks, such as studying or taking a test, to prevent brain distraction. Studies show that performance is lower when a phone is present, even if unused.
Engage in long, slow runs to purge mental noise and achieve a state of ‘wordlessness,’ which can clear mental clutter. This practice can leave you feeling refreshed and focused afterward.
Perform a brief, heavy kettlebell carry (e.g., 70 pounds, end-to-end twice) immediately upon waking to increase alertness. This teaches your body to anticipate work and makes you more alert from the start of the day.
Distance yourself from truly cynical individuals as their negativity can be unproductive and act like a ‘virus’ to your own hope and creative drive. Cynicism often equates to negativity and being a ‘buzzkill’.
Engage in therapy to gain self-awareness and connect dots about personal issues, understanding that it provides insight rather than complete resolution. It helps you understand yourself better without necessarily eliminating the ‘friction’ that fuels creativity.
Employ humor as a strategy to gain social acceptance and connect with new groups, especially when feeling like an ‘outsider.’ This can be a powerful tool for building rapport and making people like you.