lowering the stakes
Welcome to the first Renaissance Lab newsletter/blog! I thought I’d kick things off with my number one, go-to creativity tool: lowering the stakes.
Pressure can be great for performance and execution — it helps us finish projects and bring our A-game when it counts. But pressure is also an imagination killer.
Since connecting to our imagination is the foundation for creativity, one of the best things we can do is to practice lowering the stakes and bringing a sense of lightness and curiosity to our work.
If you’re struggling to remember what lightness and curiosity feel like, you’re not alone! So many of us work in pressure cookers, and may not have experienced low-stakes curiosity-driven inquiry in a long time. Or maybe it comes easily in some contexts but is elusive in others. Don’t worry, wherever you’re at — you’re in good company and we’ll be diving deep on this as Renaissance Lab gets underway.
The creative process: Play — Refine — Finish
I think of the creative process looking something like this:
The play component is where imagination comes in. It’s foundational because it generates ideas that we can then refine. Without it, we’d be stuck refining the same ideas until the end of time. In design thinking, you might call this divergence. I like to think about it as play because it gives a flavour of how we’re feeling when we do it.
You might have other words that resonate - exploration, daydreaming, brainstorming, wondering. Check out the ‘Building blocks of creativity’ downloadable in the Renaissance Lab library and try them on for size.
What does ‘lowering the stakes’ mean?
Something is high-stakes when a lot rides on the outcome. When we lower the stakes, we shift our relationship to outcome – we’re saying it doesn’t matter, or it matters far less than we thought. Instead, we get interested in process.
We might even expect or hope that the outcome will be bad, because what we’re really interested in is the learning, surprises and happy accidents that occur along the way.
Signs that you’ve successfully lowered the stakes might include:
laughter and silliness
feeling lighter, freer, more curious or connected
complete absorption
having fun
Like anything else, lowering the stakes requires practice. And to do that, we might even need to lower the stakes on learning how to lower the stakes!
Pressure is important, just not when we play
I want to be careful not to imply that we should never raise the stakes or that pressure is bad. Pressure is incredibly useful in lots of contexts, including the ‘refine’ and ‘finish’ stages in the creative process. Deadlines help us get projects over the line; and that adrenalin surge before a performance? Absolute gold.
I think of it more as cultivating our ability to move between states of high and low pressure.
When we get better at lowering the stakes and making space for play, we can enter high-stakes situations with more energy and better ideas. It also helps us discern what the stakes actually are in a given situation.
I know for myself, when I’m in a sustained high-pressure environment – that rolling-crisis feeling – it gets harder to spot what’s actually needed. Everything can feel high-stakes, as if one wrong move in any direction could lead to disaster.
The trouble with this approach is that it’s much easier to ramp up than it is to dial down - and in ramping up, we lose the conditions for creativity and new ideas.
Gently does it
If you’ve been operating in a chronically high-stakes environment where failure isn’t safe, dialing down will take time.
Play isn’t trivial. It can feel uncomfortable if we haven’t done it in a while because we’re connecting to deep parts of ourselves. As I understand the neuroscience, the imagination lives in a part of the brain that’s also responsible for our sense of self. You might have an intuitive experience of this – that feeling of coming back to yourself when you do something you loved as a kid or get lost in creative activity.
Start gently and see what you can explore in the privacy of your own mind, or in a group setting that feels safe and aligned with the low-stakes, curiosity-led, judgment-free vibe (trust your gut on this). You can also check out our new monthly event, Doodle Cafe launching early 2026, which is all about this.
A low-stakes experiment
If you’re keen to try this for yourself, pick a question, idea or activity you’ve been thinking about – something that’s felt sticky – and ask:
How could I lower the stakes around this? What would it feel like to play around with it for a bit? What could I test out, just for fun/interest?
We’re looking for that sense of lightness and curiosity, with as little as possible riding on the outcome. Get interested in the process and keep an eye out for surprises. If it feels like a spectacular failure at any point, fantastic. Throw your hands up, laugh and if you want to, share it with someone you trust (I’d love to hear about your experiments too – feel free to email me).
My own low-stakes experiment
In the spirit of togetherness, I thought I’d close by sharing that this blog is my own experiment in lowering the stakes around writing — something that’s felt sticky for me for a long time. I’ll keep you posted on how it goes, and if there’s a spectacular failure you’ll obviously be the first to know!
As Renaissance Lab gets going, I’d also love to hear from you on what you’re finding helpful / any feedback / questions or ideas you’d like me to cover. You can email me anytime at hello@kateyesberg.com.
Studio life
For those of you just here for the art, this section’s for you!
Earlier this month I opened Fortune II at the Turner Centre in Kerikeri – my largest body of work to date with 11 paintings and a whole year of work. Seeing them all up on the wall was quite amazing. We also had an incredible two weeks in Te Tai Tokerau with lots of exploring and beach time.
Since we got back, I’ve been making little A5 drawings with black pen and coloured pencils. Pure play, although I’m feeling quite tickled by them and am looking forward to seeing how they develop. After an intense finish on Fortune II, a little break from painting has felt good – although the energy is rising so I imagine I’ll be back to it next week.
On the music front: Love Party is opening for Same Name Confusion at Meow in Wellington tomorrow, Saturday 15 November. Grab tickets here. I’ve also restocked our Love Party merch on Bandcamp.
Creative power to you.
Kate x