Time, remember that?

Maybe it’s the fact I have two young kids and with that comes lots of things I don’t need in life, like lots of sleepless nights, lots of laundry and washing up, and lots of unfinished to-do lists. But the one thing I don’t seem to have lots of is time.

It often makes me nostalgic for a time when life seemed simpler, when there was time to actually do stuff. Time to waste. Time to make mistakes. Time to, well, think. I know I’m not the only one who feels like this. And it can’t purely be down to having kids. Life in general just feels supercharged now, as if someone pressed a permanent fast-forward button. Everyone wants and, more crucially, expects things now.

I’m not one of those “things were better in my days” types (although I am when it comes to football and the price of crisps - £1.50 for a single bag that’s mostly air? Madness) but it feels like in the past few years there’s been a real shift in people wanting things to be done so quickly that we overlook how important taking a beat and slowing things down really is. When I started out in advertising there was a general acceptance that things took a certain amount of time - mainly because they did. We were fortunate we didn’t have things like AI to make everyone think anything can be done in a matter of seconds. Instead, we had natural pauses built into the process. Things that, on one hand, could be seen as a hindrance really, like finding a meeting room when everyone was eventually free, waiting for the render bar to inch forward, or getting a proof biked across town (corners creased, slightly damp from rain).

But, from my experience as a producer, those breaks were important. They reminded us that things can’t just happen instantly. They gave us time to reflect, go for a pint or cuppa to connect, or just switch off for a bit. And even though these feel like small things, they’re a really important part of the creative process. We thought those pauses were delays. They were actually incubators for our best ideas.

^ Above illustration by Alva Skog ^

It’s not just these breaks in the creative process. It’s also about the appreciation of time to be able to do something properly and allow craft to truly happen. Time to push a brief so far you end up somewhere strange and exciting. Yes it’s good to test your creative chops with a pitch or super quick turnaround brief, but if every project is like that it’s not sustainable - or enjoyable. And does it really always end up in the best work?

So yes, maybe I’m nostalgic for a time when life was simpler because a lot of my life is controlled by two small children. But really, I’m nostalgic for when people wanted to use their time to prioritise doing things well over doing things quickly. The idea may be key but it’s also how you bring that to life, and often that’s the part you really need to carve out the time for to make something truly brilliant.