You being here means more than you know. Knowing it lands with someone like you keeps me going. I'm Lavena Xu-Johnson. I write about psychology for founders. Why? Because scaling a business means scaling ourselves first. Welcome to Insane Founder.
Happy Wednesday, my dear founders,
It’s 7 p.m., dinner time, and I’m still on word zero.
It’s been an ordinary day: I made my coffee, did morning yoga, had my team catch-up, replied to emails and Slack, took my son to his martial arts class, and opened the laptop in the parents’ area for the third attempt at this week’s letter.
Two outlines drafted, two erased. I’m all about that spark when it comes to writing, and, if I’m honest, your replies, feedback, and stats reward me for being stubborn; you enjoy reading what I genuinely loved writing.
But what if the spark doesn’t come?
On the drive home, my husband told me about the resistance he’s feeling while working on the narrative game he’s building after work. He stopped for a few weeks, and it’s been awfully painful to get back into it. Often, without realizing it, we tie our ego and self-worth to a project we truly care about. The invisible pressure can be unbearable, especially in my husband’s case; his ideal identity is a self-published game developer, not a high-paying product role at a European tech unicorn.
Does that mean that if we set ego aside and focus on serving and delivering value to our audience, we won’t get stuck?
This stuck feeling is not limited to creating something entirely new. It shows up when we try to shape a strategy memo, design a hiring scorecard, or outline a deck.
Let’s examine why creative block shows up even when intrinsic motivation is high and our goal is to serve.
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What is happening physiologically
A neuroscientist would say writer’s block is far from a lack of inspiration or laziness, it is a tug-of-war between three internal systems that all desire control:
The executive system
Executive Control Network (ECN): The dorsolateral prefrontal cortex is the key region in the brain for planning, monitoring, evaluating, and correcting. A study of 12 rappers found that, when they freestyled in an fMRI machine, activity in the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex decreased. When our executive function quiets down, we enter a more relaxed, less inhibited mental state that enables creativity.
The default network
Default Mode Network (DMN): This is our mind-wandering, associative, daydreaming network. It retrieves seemingly less obvious and irrelevant ideas, leading to novel remote connections, insights, and even metaphors.
The threat system
Amygdala & The Salience Network (SN): When we face a blank page, the salience network flags potential social evaluation. If our brain interprets that as a threat, amygdala-centered circuits activate the stress systems, raising arousal, making us feel uneasy, urgent, and a bit foggy.
Triple networks are referred to as the triple network: Default mode network (DMN, blue colour), central executive network (CEN, red colour), and salience network (SN, green colour).
A block occurs when the executive system polices every sentence, the threat system sounds an alarm, and the default network is left with no oxygen. We are trying to invent, evaluate, and defend simultaneously.
This is nothing unfamiliar to founders, because our work trains hypervigilance. We spend most days in decision hygiene and risk management, which is great for shipping the final work, but it’s terrible for the creativity required for page zero.
Our brain is far from rational, because its priority is to keep us safe.
Self-determination theory
Now that we have laid the basics of our physiological state, you could just reset with some inhales and exhales, and your creativity should flood in. End of story…
…at least that’s what AI told me to write:
Real-life evidence of AI’s best attempt to strangle my creativity further for this article.
Sure, that works, but does that really solve the core issue? As much as the creative block is physiological, it is also psychological; it’s a two-way road. If we want to tell our body that the ‘fear’ is not real, breathwork is well-supported as highly effective in reducing stress, but sometimes the source of the internal conflict sits somewhere deeper.
What gets stuck when we’re intrinsically motivated, curious, and passionate about the work we do?
The conversation on motivation starts with Edward Deci and Richard Ryan, whose Self-Determination Theory, developed in the mid-1980s, redefined the field and became a foundation for modern motivation research and practice.
Self-determination theory holds that motivation flows from three basic needs:
Autonomy: the sense that we are in control.
Competence: the felt belief that we can make progress that matters.
Relatedness: the feeling that we are connected to people who matter in this work.
The work propels us onwards when these elements are all in their place. When one of these factors is compromised, our creative system shuts down, and our motivation becomes fragile. When the market, the daily demands of a business, or our personal expectations squeeze one or more of these demands, we feel stuck.
Where entrepreneurs get drained
Autonomy: recurring deadlines, investor expectations, and public roadmaps turn exploration into.. more of an obligation. Sometimes we had to do what we promised, not what we chose. Even a small loss of authorship can flip curiosity into compliance.
Competence: our past wins or mistakes reinforce the narrative we tell ourselves about our competence, when stakes are higher, we begin to monitor every move. If we consistently over-analyse our moves, we lose our grip on momentum.
Relatedness: we are not creating into a void, we are creating for real users, audience, and customers. If we imagine the room to be hostile or feel alone in the work, our nervous system’s temporary protective response could make us feel even more isolated.
A slow diagnostic
In times of stuckness, let’s invite ourselves to three open questions and hold any urge to judge or feed the inner critics.
Autonomy: where did I lose the sense that I am choosing to solve/serve for this problem (the core service or product for your business)?
Competence: what tiny step would prove to me that I can still do this?
Relatedness: if I made this for one person today, who would make it feel safer and more alive?
Answer in one sentence each, and dive deeper into the question that took you the longest to answer.
Applying self-determination theory to creative block
If autonomy is compromised:
Rebuild the sense of choice by making one decision you fully own and stating it in writing before you start. Define the specific outcome you are choosing to produce today, the boundaries you will respect (what is in and out of scope), and the reasons this outcome matters to your business right now. Convert the task into a short brief addressed to yourself that includes a default plan: “I will deliver X by Y time with Z constraints”, with an opt-out condition to justify any changing course.
By turning vague obligations into a clear, chosen commitment with transparent limits, you reduce avoidance, remove hidden “shoulds,” and give yourself a safe space to create in.
If competence is compromised:
Replace self-doubt with evidence by setting up a tiny, time-boxed experiment that can succeed today. Define a measurable unit of progress you can produce in 30–60 minutes, specify the acceptance criteria in advance, and ship it - whether it’s your Notion doc, your task tracker, or a team member’s inbox. Track the result against your criteria, note what was easier or harder than expected, and decide the next unit before you stop. This turns confidence from a feeling into a data point, which is the fastest way to restart momentum.
If relatedness is compromised:
Reach out to one person in your community. Write one sentence about their context, make the smallest version that would help them today, send it, and ask them one humble question: “In what way can I make my product/service twice as useful for you?” The fast, relevant feedback replaces isolation with a clear next step, which breaks the block. (When I feel unsure with my weekly article, I reread your comments and replies, they’re my quickest way back to clarity.)
We do not unblock by pushing harder.
We unblock by giving each of our needs its turn, and showing ourselves a small win.
So, dear reader, how could I make my psychology newsletter twice as useful for you?
How's the depth of today's edition?
As always, hit reply if something in here hits home.
Until next week,
Lavena
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