create

Most jobs lack creativity. You are rarely the sole agent responsible for birthing a new concept/idea/framework/product, and even if you are in a creative field, you may only be doing a small part in a much larger production.

Therefore, to satisfy the creative itch, you need to seek it in your daily life.

Consumption is unfortunately much easier than sitting down and starting to create something.

The barriers :

  1. I’m not good enough
  2. (If you do share) - no one will use this/read/look at this
  3. (If they do look at it) - they won’t like it

Proceed to either :

  1. Giving up on the enterprise
  2. Procrastinate in creating anything
  3. Create something and judge yourself (harshly) about the standard of the work

Let’s address these barriers one by one.

I’m not good enough

  • Compared to someone who does whatever you do full time - yes you are not world class. You are not even good probably. You are most likely average (if lucky) or below average.
  • Once you’ve accepted this, and realised it is true, it stops being a problem.
  • How do you get better? Repetition of-course
  • TLDR : Make 100 crappy things, and maybe one will be ok

No-one will use this/read/look at this

  • This is probably true as well
  • But you (future you) may look at it.
  • Quality isn’t correlated with the number of eyeballs looking at something.
  • TLDR : Create for an audience of one. Satisfy your own creative itch

They won’t like it

  • Who are you trying to impress?
  • Most people ignore the majority of work created. We’re all lost in a sea of TikTok, instagram and YouTube, our attention spans progressively shrinking to the point where we just become indifferent to most ‘content’
  • If they don’t like it, you probably won’t hear about it for this reason
  • So might as well just make it and let it go.
  • TLDR : Create and let it go. Any work you do says very little about you as a person

This post is basically kicking myself to start creating sometime again. Having just finished my exams (medical exams are never ending, hopefully this will be the last), I haven’t’ ‘created’ anything in a while. No writing. No music. No photography.

Time to start adding it back into my life. This short ramble is a good start.