Why the creative process is often painful for you and why we must have trust.
If you’re a logical creative (something I’ll talk more about later), you probably suffer when you make stuff.
The Logical creative: someone who is both logical, analytical, who loves to think and plan, but can also drop in and create the shit out of something.
Making stuff is hard.
We don’t give ourselves enough credit.
“Creativity is the power to connect the seemingly unconnected.” – William Plomer
You’re wrestling with infinity, an unwinnable match.
“A work of art is never finished, merely abandoned.” – Paul Valéry
It takes courage to move forward even though you don’t know what will come out the other side and how it will be perceived by the world (audience, clients, customers, RAOTI – random assholes on the internet).
True creativity is endless and infinite.
We can only bring into existence a small fraction of what we can imagine, but as you know, this is changing exponentially (AI).
So what does this mean?
To me, this means I need to remember that creativity is messy and oftentimes out of my control. I must trust the process and walk into the creative fog without expectations and continue to hone my craft.
This has never let me down. What’s let me down is my own mind. My lack of belief. My inability to commit. My inconsistency and my imposter syndrome. Fuck that.
Creators create, it’s messy, confusing, painful and ugly, until it’s not. Check out this video of Paul McCartney composing get back.
And what can we do?
- Heal our relationship with the messy middle.
- Create a process that you can work within that allows for just the right amount of creativity (not too boundless, not too structured).
- Embrace failure (get the bad drafts out of the way quickly).
- Take breaks and come back to it with fresh eyes.
- Get in the reps (practice as much as you can).
- Collaborate with others.
- Join the Box if you keep getting distracted or overwhelmed.
Remember what Einstein said, “Creativity is intelligence having fun.“
Happy wrestling.
