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Creativity is one of life's great mysteries. Not because we don't know what it is. At its core it simply means coming up with something both novel and useful. And not because we can't identify its components. Novelty and utility are straightforward enough on their own.
Coming up with something novel? That's easy. A football with an embedded AI voice interface specially trained to talk about birdlife in western Norway. Finding something useful? Also simple. A toothbrush. But combining both qualities, creating something that's both novel and useful, that's where the real challenge is.
To describe the indescribable
Given how much human progress traces back to creative ideas, it's no wonder we want to crack the mystery of creativity. Attempts to describe the creative process have therefore, unsurprisingly, been manifold. Both within and outside of academia.
The real value of these descriptions, for me at least, is not as a best practice process to think or act to generate better creative ideas. They are more sources of inspiration for my own thinking, and so helping me better understand how the creative process works for me.
While there are universal components of the creative process, creativity is also highly personal. People approach it differently, and different people have their own understanding of how elements of the the creative process works for them.
Learning about how others see the creative process from their own, personal perspective, is therefore just as interesting, if not more, than academic takes on the topic. But the real beauty is that reading how the likes of Steve Jobs, Richard Hamming, Jaron Lanier and Rick Rubin reflect on their creative processes, sets in motion reflections on how it works for each of us. Is it similar? Different? How?
But beyond just reflecting upon it, trying to put words and structure to these reflections is an even more interesting exercise. Because it forces us to turn something highly abstract, into something very concrete. Will it be accurate? Unlikely. Useful? I think so.
So here is an attempt to pen down how the creative process works for me. Hopefully, it can serve as inspiration for others, as other people's descriptions have served as inspiration for me. But regardless, describing this in words helps me better understand how I think. So here we go:
The particles
The famous abstract painter and teacher at Bauhaus, Wassily Kandinsky, once said that everything starts with a dot. And that is where the creative process starts for me. With a dot. A particle. A thought. A reflection. A new learning. An observation. An experience.
This dot could be from myself in the form of an observation or experience, or more often, it comes from someone else. Some new thing I learn, read, see or hear.
This dot is usually without a direction, without a context. When I look at it I don't really know where it's going, or what I can use it for. But it interests me enough to remember it. I write it down in my notebook, or store it behind my ear. Just like a tiny particle floating by itself in a void.
The cloud
Then I get another dot. A new reflection, observation, thought, experience or learning. It can be related to the first one way or another, but usually it is not. I take note of it anyhow.
Then I add another one. And another one.
Over time, the dots reach a number so large they can best be described as a cloud of knowledge particles. A cloud that seems to have something that keeps them together, but it's unclear what, and the bindings are yet so loose that the cloud cannot be touched. Like a cosmic nebula of stardust particles yet to form any meaningful connections.
The knowledge particles making up the cloud range in size from simple thoughts, reflections or observations, to longer stories or experiences from myself or others.
The pull
Then, at some point, the cloud starts to contract. Not all of it, but some of the particles, certain thoughts, experiences, or insights start to connect or resonate with each other, compelled by the gravitational pull of creativity. Disparate pieces of knowledge start to converge and connect into something more concrete. Some of the connections are conscious and deliberate, others appear unconsciously.
As the gravitational pull of an idea gains momentum, it amasses more matter and forms yet new merged elements and new connections. And at some point, the gravitational pull is so strong that the idea suddenly lights up. Like stardust being turned into a protostar. This illuminating moment can happen anywhere. In the shower, when walking my dog, or when playing with my kids.
While the idea at this point is not yet fully formed or clear, its bright light and emerging form is clear enough that I know if this is something to further explore.
But the idea cannot grow into a full-blown star unless it gets more matter to burn. For ideas, this does not happen automatically. It requires hard work. Because regardless of how attractive that first light seems, it takes deliberate action and effort to figure out if it has the potential to become a full-blown star.
When it does have potential and the necessary work has been laid down in exploring, evaluating, reflecting, and extending the ideas, the connections become denser and more defined. The idea matures and reaches its "main sequence" stage. A stage where it shines brightly as a fully formed concept. Just as a star fuels itself through nuclear fusion, the idea sustains itself through continuous refinement, feedback, and real-world testing.
The system
But it doesn't stop with the main sequence idea. Just like the planets of our solar system are made up of left-over elements of our sun’s formation, other ideas form as extensions, refinements and alternatives to the one large idea. What started as a seemingly unconnected knowledge dots or particles, has with the help of gravity converged to a fully formed idea and its own solar system of extensions.
But the star and its revolving planets are not alone. They are part of larger galaxies containing myriads of ideas (stars) and its derived ideas (planets, gas and matter). All kept together as one consistent whole partially by the gravity of each other's mass. And partially by something else. Something more mysterious and less understood. Something that allows them to evolve and form yet new combinations over time.
In the universe this something is dark matter. An invisible form of matter that we can't see directly but which makes up about 85% of the matter in the universe. Dark matter is the gravitational "glue" that holds galaxies together. In our minds this something is creativity.
Creativity is the dark matter of the mind. The essential piece of the puzzle that we cannot observe, pinpoint or directly explain. The force we know is there because it is the matter that makes sure that all our bright ideas do not just spin away in every possible direction.
Takeaway
So what can you take away from all this lofty chatter about stardust, stars, galaxies and dark matter?
While the metaphor is high level, and it describes a personal process, I do believe there might be some points of more general relevance here.
The first comes from the stardust phase. In a famous Wired Interview from 1996, Steve Jobs said that the reason some people were more creative than others was because some have more experiences or thought more about their experiences than others. Unfortunately, having seemingly disparate experiences or interests is often seen as less useful because it doesn't drive someone towards a clear goal. When I, as a professor in strategy, spend nights fiddling with music technology or reading about renaissance painters, it's not clear to me or outsiders that this is good for whatever important problems I need to tackle in my professional life.
I have had enough experiences to prove this wrong, to confidently ignore it. When I have something that catches my attention and curiosity, I follow the white rabbit. I always learn something new, and from time to time these learnings turn out to be key to solving a problem I am tackling in a very different domain.
With all the focus on productivity, goal setting and deliberate practice, collecting enough disparate experiences, observations and learnings has likely become more difficult. And that is a shame. To counter this pressure, we need to believe in the process, and comfort ourselves that one day, even the most useless knowledge is actually useful for creativity.
A second takeaway is the power of time. In my experience, creativity is a slow process. We might be seduced by week-long innovation sprints and two-day creative processes, but gathering necessary raw material, and letting them ferment in your unconscious mind takes time. So the eureka or aha-moments in the shower are usually not a light bulb that pops out of thin air. It is your unconscious mind that has worked hard over time to find connections between the knowledge particles in your brain. And when it does, the gravitational pull of the idea suddenly brings it to life. From the outside, it might seem random. But it isn't.
A third takeaway is the part of hard work. An idea is just an idea. And people who are very creative tend to come up with many more ideas than others. While it is a skill to be good at selecting which ideas might hold promise and which don't, it also requires hard work to nurture an idea into something real and tangible. Or in the words of Nietzsche: "All great artists and thinkers are great workers, indefatigable not only in inventing, but also in rejecting, sifting, transforming, ordering."
A forth and final takeaway is about trust. Just as astrophysicists can't see dark matter directly but trust in its existence because of its effects, we need to trust in our creative process. The dots might seem random, and the connections might take time. But rest assured that the gravitational pull of creativity is always at work - even when we can't see it happening. And sooner or later, that useless knowledge can indeed become useful.
So next time you find yourself collecting seemingly random bits of knowledge, or following curiosities that seem to lead nowhere, remember: you're not wasting time. You're gathering stardust for your next big idea. At least that is how I think about it.