(quick one today)
The single most important lesson I’ve learned about the creative process:
You need input to get output.
Creativity isn’t just about doing the creative thing itself.
It’s about putting pre-creativity pieces into your brain so it can jostle around for however long and then come out as something
cool.
Call it inspiration, call it fodder, call it research, call it clearing your head…
But whatever you call it doesn’t matter.
What matters is doing it.
Leaving your surroundings and everything you’re normalized to, and seeing or doing something different.
One of my clients says you need to spend an hour a day of “inputting” if you want to stay sharp, creative, and filled up as a
writer.
To her this means things like browsing YouTube and Instagram to see what other people are doing and talking about, reading books
waaaaay far out of your areas of interest, and good ol’ fashioned touching grass.
I remember this old season of Project Runway where the designers were tasked with wandering the streets of New York with a
handheld camera (remember those things?). They were supposed to take pictures of things that inspired them.
And people were taking pictures of things like bridges and the Chrysler Building, and one dude got really inspired by a puddle in
the asphalt.
I mean, that was kinda weird, but also I kinda got it. When you slow down, with nothing to do but notice what you notice, you
start to see things differently.
Same goes for hearing. Whether it’s new people or new ideas or new music, you start to notice things.
Take a different route. Read a different blog. Go into a pawn shop or a camping store or a mediterranean grocer for the first
time.
Poke around at a different part of the world for a few minutes.
See what happens…
Maybe something. Maybe nothing.
(Nothing yet, anyway.)
That’s all I’ve got for today.
