Why creative work feels hard - and why that’s the point

Spoiler-free, Great British Bake Off-inspired writing advice

Hello there, Chris here

Unless you’ve been hiding under a rock (cake) for the past few weeks it can’t have escaped your attention that it was the grand final of the 2024 The Great British Bake Off (GBBO) series 15 last night.¹ *Don’t worry, no spoilers.*

At the time of writing, I don’t know the winner either. So, I thought I’d delve into the Bake-Off back catalogue for today’s newsletter.

Wind back a few years to 2021’s final. Three bakers line up behind their gingham cloth-covered benches to hear what fresh hell the judges will unleash on them in their last ever technical challenge. Who will go home? Will it be Crystelle who loves bringing flavours of her Kenyan heritage into her pastries, breads and cakes? Will it be Chigs, the happy go lucky sales manager who taught himself how to bake over lockdown or will it be family man and engineer Giuseppe whose bakes are neat as a pin? All three have endured nine weeks of this gruelling competition. All three are equally matched – any could win. Whether it’s because of an under-baked Genoise sponge, a runny caramel or a soggy shortcrust, only one can win.

The challenge? To bake 12 perfect Belgian buns filled with lemon curd and sultanas. Sounds manageable, right? But there’s an evil catch. ‘You’re going to have to really use your baking knowledge on this one,’ announces Bake Off judge and master baker Paul Hollywood, ‘because we’ve taken out most of the method’. The recipe is missing most of the instructions. Instead of a step-by-step guide, the bakers get just two lines:

1. Make Belgian buns filled with lemon curd and sultanas.

2. Pipe icing in a zigzag pattern and finish with half a glacé cherry.

What should they do first? How long should the dough prove? What even is a Belgian bun supposed to look like? With no prior preparation and only their wits to guide them, the bakers face two and a half hours of guesswork, improvisation, and rising panic.

The two kinds of tasks

Harvard psychologist Teresa Amabile explains that tasks fall into two categories: algorithmic and heuristic. Algorithmic tasks follow a clear, predefined sequence of steps. Think of baking a cake from a recipe - if you measure the ingredients correctly and follow the instructions, you’re guaranteed to get a predictable result.

Heuristic tasks, on the other hand, are a different beast. These involve experimentation and creativity. When you bake without a recipe - or create a new kind of cake altogether - you’re entering heuristic territory. There’s no guaranteed path to success, only trial and error.

In the early weeks of Bake Off, technical challenges are primarily algorithmic. Contestants must demonstrate precision and skill in following instructions. But by the final, the challenges shift. With recipes stripped down to the bare essentials, the bakers must rely on intuition, experience and creativity. It’s no longer about following steps; it’s about forging a path when the way forward is unclear.

Introducing disfluency

This lack of clarity introduces something psychologists call disfluency. Disfluency is the opposite of smoothness or ease. It’s what you feel when you’re stuck, uncertain, or forced to struggle through a problem without clear instructions. Unlike algorithmic tasks, heuristic tasks are inherently disfluent. They demand trial and error, and they rarely give you a sense of progress until you’re done - if you ever finish.

Creativity and innovation are steeped in disfluency. Whether you’re inventing a new vaccine, designing a new product, writing a novel, or baking Belgian buns without a recipe, you can’t rely on a clear roadmap. Instead, you proceed through false starts, failed experiments, and occasional flashes of insight.

A necessary struggle

Disfluency isn’t pleasant. It’s frustrating, and our instinct is to avoid it. We prefer tasks where we can measure our progress and predict the outcome. But disfluency is not just an inevitable part of creative work - it’s also what makes that work meaningful.

Take Ben Horowitz, the entrepreneur and venture capitalist. In his book The Hard Thing About Hard Things, Horowitz explains that the hardest challenges in business come without a playbook. There’s no recipe for laying off employees or navigating a market crash. “The hard thing is when you don’t know the answer,” he writes. For Horowitz, this uncertainty is a struggle to overcome - a trial by fire that defines successful leaders.

But disfluency isn’t just a test of endurance or a rite of passage. It’s a guide. The friction, uncertainty, and doubt you feel in creative work are signs that you’re engaging with something new and original. Disfluency forces you to think deeply, experiment, and push beyond what’s comfortable. Without it, there’s no innovation -only repetition.

Partnering with disfluency

Bake Off contestants who succeed at the technical challenges do so not because they avoid disfluency but because they embrace it in one way or another. When faced with an incomplete recipe, they don’t freeze or panic (well, not for long). Instead, they use their creativity, baking knowledge, and willingness to fail fast and adapt. In doing so, they transform uncertainty into a beautiful tray of Belgian buns - or at least something close enough.

In the same way, we can’t avoid disfluency in creative work. But we can learn to partner with it. Instead of seeing friction and uncertainty as problems to be solved, we can treat them as essential parts of the process. Disfluency isn’t good or bad - it’s just what happens when you step off the beaten path. And that’s where the magic happens.

Until next time, Chris

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Why writing isn't like following a recipe

1. If you haven’t heard of it, perhaps don’t live in the UK, or have indeed been living under a rock cake, The Great British Bake Off is a TV sensation. It’s a baking battle where passionate baking fans compete to be crowned the UK’s Best Amateur Baker. Each week has a theme – such as vegan bakes, patisserie or bread – and each episode sees the bakers tackling three challenges which become progressively harder over the series. They begin with the ‘signature bake’ and end with the ‘showstopper’ but in the middle of the show they must endure the dreaded ‘technical’. Unlike the other two challenges, contestants have no idea what they’ll be asked to bake in the technical – it’s a complete surprise. They are given a recipe to follow, all the equipment and ingredients they need and expected to produce a perfect result. It’s a huge test of their baking skill and a challenge that lays bare the level of know-how the bakers have.