Looking towards 2027
Why what you'll be doing 18 months from now matters more than a new year resolution
Gary Bloomer | SHAKING THE TREE # 277
Content creator? You’re being sold a bright and brilliant, over-packaged lie.
It’s a lie wrapped in the shiny paper of urgency tied with a bow of self-doubt, a lie polished with an endless torrent of impressive case studies; a lie delivered 24/7 in every headline screaming “2026 Trends You MUST Capitalize On NOW!”
That’s because we’re living inside a content creation machine that only knows one word: “Next!”
Sometimes, “Next!” thinking is a good thing—as in when you hear no, again and again, because the sooner you shake off the no’s, the sooner you’ll get to yes.
But in many other senses, “Next!” breathes the short-term to the detriment of what can be. Its pulse is the quarterly report. Its nervous system is wired to flinch at every algorithm tweak. Its only nourishment is the next viral sound, the next micro-trend, the next fleeting spike on a social media monitoring dashboard.
That’s because the system is engineered to generate perpetual reaction, to pulse shock and outrage, and for immediate response, cause, and effect. And because it’s begging you to join its frantic dance with its endless music, you’re pulled in again and again, seemingly against your will, but somehow, you can’t say no.
But you can say not because deep down inside you are not a component in this huge machine. You are not part of the attention machine. You are a creator.
Your power doesn’t lie in reacting to the machine’s next flinch or spasm. Your power lies in deciding what you’re building for the day, week, month, and year after tomorrow, next week, next month, and next year, for the time long after the next “next” has been and gone and is long forgotten.
Before the end of the year I want you to do something radical.
I want you to close or ignore every trend report and and prediction for what’s to come next year and ignore it. I want you to delete the “2026 Strategy” template you just downloaded. And I want you to forget the guru’s advice and instead, I want you to ask yourself a question so simple it will feel subversive:
What will I be doing in 2027?
Not 2026. In 2027.
That’s not what you hope to be doing. This is not some gauzy, distant dream attached to a whole load of nothing; some vague notion of kinda-sorta something. It has to be something tangible and concrete: something with a visible, physical, positive outcome.
What will this reality actually look like for you two years from now?
Most beginner content creators fail within 90 days because they are sprinting full pelt in a marathon of their own devising—a marathon they have not trained for and have no hope of competing in let alone winning because they are horribly out of shape and woefully underprepared to take on the distance.
They fail because they exhaust themselves chasing the ever flickering light of immediate validation, they fail because they burn out long before they’ve even found a pace that’s right for them: steady, measured: one-two-three-four-kick, repeat.
Rather than setting in for the long haul they become tacticians and mechanics who are only in and of the present, focused only on now and next. This means they are utterly lost in terms of imagining their future because they have no solid, tangible vision of it.
But that’s not you. You have a panoramic, 360 degree view of where you’re going and where you’ll arrive. This is because you have a sense of endurance.
The creator who successfully endures the process of creating content—the one who builds something that lasts—is not a tactician or a mechanic, they are an architect of the future. They operate at a different altitude and on a different plane. They don’t see things as they are, they see things as they will be.
Think of it this way: Anyone can be excited about a project for the next month. The energy of something new over a 30-day period—the first flickers of an audience and all that, it’s intoxicating fuel that burns bright.
But while that fuel burns bright, it also burns fast. And when that fuel is spent there is nothing else to fly on. Fumes alone won’t cut it. Sure, you can glide for a while, but under the pull of gravity, eventually altitude declines and the resulting crash is inevitable.
When the fuel runs out, what carries you through the inevitable dip in months two through six?
What lifts you up and along and through with the confusing platform changes and the shifts in markets in months seven to nine?
What about the stale, harried, worn-out feelings of despair in months ten through twelve?
The antidote is to begin crafting your clear, tangible, compelling vision of 2027 now.
When you have a solid vision of where you will be two years from now, when you see it in your mind’s eye in vivid detail, when you envision the thing you’re building toward, the smaller frustrations of today or next week become more manageable—some might even say they become inconsequential—because they are smaller bumps in the road rather than being major calamities. Instead of being the be-all and end-all and the end of the story, those frustrations become minor dips and low points—all of which are more easily managed.
That vision of 2027 then becomes your compass. It allows you to evaluate every opportunity, every hot tip, every time-sucking trend against a simple filter: “Does this activity or action move the needle toward my 2027 reality?”
If the answer is no, you have the profound permission to ignore it.
So, let’s get specific. Project yourself forward into June of 2027… (or, if you’re reading this after June of 2027, project yourself 18 months into the future. Forget about being overwhelmed by the magnitude and scope of the timeframe, the time is going to pass anyway so why not set up processes and ideas now to get you toward your goal?
What is the core, repeatable act of creation that you can put in place and still genuinely enjoy? (I’m not talking about the promotional hustle of things, but the actual making?)
Who are the people in your orbit who can help you make real progress (and who is there who will hold you back? Are they clients, a community, collaborators? Are they family members, friends, a spouse? What does that relationship feel like?
What does your creative-business engine look like? This describes the things you will make or create as products. Are you looking at one flagship product, three revenue streams, sustained partnerships, or something more?
Most importantly: How do you feel about your plan and your timeline? Doe the idea of planning out a year and half or more help you become more competent? Does it bring a sense of calming resonance? Does the thought free you or trap you?
This isn’t fantasy. This is blueprinting. You cannot build your ideal future without plans and those plans need to be based in reality. What skills do you currently have that will stand you in good stead? What new skills will you need to learn to get you towards your goal and what timeframe will it take to get up to speed with those skills?
Once you have this picture in place you need to write it down and to that you need to pick your ideal date (June 2027), and then you need to work backwards.
What needs to be true and firmly in place in mid-2026 to make 2027 inevitable?
What foundational skillS must you build in Q1. of 2026 to keep you on track for Q1 of 2027? What tools and resources will you need and what sort of audience relationships must you begin nurturing and building now?
When you begin thinking longer term, suddenly, your 2026 strategy pretty much writes itself. It’s no longer a desperate scramble for relevance and visibility. It’s a more of a series of intentional, strategic steps on a long, purposeful path you laid out. The noise of the crowd fades. Your content becomes more confident because it’s no longer a reaction to trends in the market: it’s a proclamation of your direction.
So, ignore 2026. Not the year itself mind you, but the frantic, short-sighted hype that surrounds it. Look past it. Plan beyond it.
I can guarantee that few if any of your competitors are thinking this way, which is what will set you up for success while they’re thrown in the towel.
Plant your flag in 2027 and build the road back to where you stand today.
That’s how you outlast the 90-day quitters.
That’s how you build something that can’t be undone by an algorithm update.
That’s how you become not just a creator, but a lasting creative force of nature.
Now, go be a time traveler. Your future self is cheering you on!
As always, thanks for reading.
—Gary
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P.S. If you found this useful, share it with another creator who needs an ego check (in a nice way). Want more unfiltered takes on content creation? Join my newsletter. No fluff, just the stuff that works.
Next time on Shaking the Tree: Stop thinking about writing and write!
ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Originally from the U.K., Gary Bloomer is a writer, branding advocate, marketing specialist, and an award-winning graphic designer.
His design work has been included in Creative Review (one of the UK’s largest design magazines). Since 2009, he has answered over 5,000 marketing and business questions in the Know-How Exchange of MarketingProfs.com, placing him among the top 3% of contributors. He lives in Wilmington, Delaware, USA.