How to be Creative
1. Ignore everybody
2. The idea doesn’t have to be big. It just has to be yours.
3. Put the hours in.
4. If your biz depends on you suddenly being “discovered” by some big shot, your plan will probably fail.
5. You are responsible for your own experience.
6. Everyone is born creative; everyone is given a box of crayons in kindergarten.
7. Keep your day job.
8. Companies that squelch creativity can no longer compete with companies that champion creativity.
9. Everybody has their own private Mount Everest they were put on this earth to climb.
10. The more talented somebody is, the less they need the props.
11. Don’t try to stand out from the crowd; avoid crowds all together.
12. If you accept the pain, it cannot hurt you.
13. Never compare your inside with somebody else’s outside.
14. Dying young is overrated
15. The most important thing a creative person can learn professionally is where to draw the red line that separates what you are willing to do, and what you are not.
16. The world is changing.
17. Merit can be bought. Passion cannot.
18. Avoid the Watercooler Gang.
19. Sing in your own voice.
20. The choice of media is irrelevant.
21. Selling out is harder than it looks.
22. Nobody cares. Do it for yourself.
23. Worrying about “commercial vs. artistic” is a complete waste of time.
24. Don’t worry about finding inspiration. It comes eventually.
25. You have to find your own schtick.
26. Write from the heart.
27. The best way to get approval is to not need it.
28. Power is never given. Power is taken.
29. Whatever choice you make, the Devil gets his due eventually.
30. The hardest part of being creative is getting used to it.
31. Remain frugal.
32. Allow your work to age with you.
33. Being poor sucks.
34. Beware of turning hobbies into jobs.
35. Savor obscurity while it lasts.
36. Start blogging.
37. Meaning scales, people don’t.
38. When your dreams become reality, they are no longer dreams.
gapingvoid.com
artwork: Penelope Dullaghan
July 3rd, 2009 at 1:58 pm
Great incentive for anyone and specially for someone like me who is starting to build a web design portfolio.
Thank you,
Marcia
July 3rd, 2009 at 9:54 pm
OK, pardon my passion.
One way to look at this question is to separate the degree to which people are living their creativity, -vs- crediting the boss with their good ideas, doing the political grovelling, and changing you the SEO every 6 weeks to out-wit the search robots…all for a check.Green paper rules your life? I don’t get that.
It takes a boatload of courage to challenge the norm, think divergently, weather the reprimands for doing the job you were hired to do in a ‘creative department’.
Living one’s creativity means constantly seeing the colors, the absurdity and the warmth of common people called customers. And sometimes the smell. Eeeuw.
Real creatives will live like a pauper to do their work on a strict meritocracy level. No manager needs to approve, or convince them that adding a boilerplate corporate touch will make their work better.
There are dare-devil souls whose objectives are constant betterment, understanding people…lots of people, knowing more, creating greater effects on the recipients of their creativity. They spend their few pieces of green paper on a new program, a finer paint brush, or splurge on a punctuation sale.(Bargain basement apostrophes.)
The business world needs to wise up and hire these disruptive, failure-tolerant weirdos and treat them like royalty. Let them be non-linear on behalf of your company. Keep the boilerplate and template masters on staff too. They also have great value.
I truly believe business has to examine the calibrated same-ol’ same-ol’ and do the counter-intuitive thing, because a change has got to come.
Am I right, ladies?
July 4th, 2009 at 10:47 am
Get out of your element - do things you don’t normally do. Observe the details of things around you and slow your pace.
July 6th, 2009 at 2:45 am
You are creative when you combine existing elements in a new structure.
July 8th, 2009 at 1:36 pm
This is a good list. I will print it out and reference it in the future. Thanks!
July 8th, 2009 at 8:34 pm
These words - so true!
Thank you for an inspiring kick in the pants!
August 24th, 2009 at 1:58 pm
Great list.
I’d like to add thoughts as:
Its a 24/7 process.
Without the dreaming Design would be nothing!
Flexibility is part of the deal.
Agree to Disagree or vice versa helps.
http://dsignconcepts.blogspot.com/
Put the “D” for Design into your company website.
August 25th, 2009 at 11:12 am
Beautifull and true
: ) and : (
Thank you
: ))
September 11th, 2009 at 8:58 am
You are more than welcome. Thank you to everyone for their additional ideas and thoughts! Let’s keep it going! You can also check out a discussion in this same vein here: http://scotthull.com/artists/blog/what-is-your-secret-in-being-creative/