8 ms·

You're not lacking creativity, you're overwhelmed

187 points by alexzeitler 3y ago

t0bia_s 3y ago
- "But the single most effective thing you can do to ensure the value of your feeds, is to start blocking the content you don’t align with." Then you risk of closing yourself into bubble. I prefer to not use any kind of feeds manipulated by algorithms. No social networks at all. Instead use RSS.
alisson_dover 3y ago
Creativity requires space. Can't remember who said it (paraphrasing): dedicate at least 4 hours to the process, you might end up being creative for only 10 minutes of that time.
- Karstographer 3y ago
  I'm sure it's been said many times, but John Cleese did provide a memorable talk on it [1] and particularly touched on the relation to stress. And if anyone feels like they have troubles with stress/anxiety, Robert Sapolsky provides some great insight into how and why it affects health overall [2]. I'm not sure if Sapolsky's material will help reduce stress, but it was pretty entertaining along the way. Two great speeches that it would be a shame to lose. Now, what was that about keeping up with digital clutter? [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pb5oIIPO62g https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pb5oIIPO62g [2] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D9H9qTdserM https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D9H9qTdserM
- hobs 3y ago
  Generally I find boredom or challenge is a prerequisite for my creativity to start percolating - but overdosing on boredom yields more creativity (to stave it off), while overdosing on challenges generally leads me to burnout.
  - alisson_dover 3y ago
    That's a good observation. I tend to over-index on challenges and often end up distracting myself for long enough to completely drain myself of all energy to be creative.
- m463 3y ago
  I find much creativity when I am awake but haven't gotten out of bed in the morning. (I do need my phone to capture it)
robg 3y ago
This 1000 times. Why is it that we don’t optimize for brain power? The brain lacking sleep and under stress is designed to survive, not thrive. Our strongest muscle is weakest when we need it most to prioritize survival.
- Almondsetat 3y ago
  >Why is it that we don’t optimize for brain power? who is "we"? how many people do you know who are informed on the matter? how can you expect society to revolve around this if it's still mostly overlooked?
sosodev 3y ago
This seems like nonsense. The author claims that we're overwhelmed by the volume of content we consume and that's why we can't be creative. So the suggested solution is to do more work to consume content? That doesn't make any sense to me.
- thejorgemedina 3y ago
  Hey, author here :) Having enlightening experiences of learning requires effort. Anybody who wants to learn and thrive on any topic needs to make an effort to curate the sources he's consuming. That's not new. It certainly isn't an internet thing. We've always paid to be entertained and educated. And money is earned with effort. When content wasn't as abundant, you needed to be selective with what you wanted to consume. You developed a taste, and continued to consume that type of content, hence basically becoming a curator of whatever your interest was. The problem now, with all content being free, is that we pay with our time. And time is our most valuable currency. So yes. Even though there's an initial effort curve to build a Second brain (or any other system you like), the end result is a much better internet experience.
- wizzledonker 3y ago
  This was my impression as well. I think people actually feeling burnt out creatively might read this and get a forlorn feeling that what is required is more work, and then go straight back to mindlessly scrolling
- maitkin 3y ago
  Exactly right, this article wrongly imagines we can treat the problem by exercising the problem. Learn to sit still and give your deep mind a chance to be present, this might lead to actual creativity.
- babblingfish 3y ago
  Agreed, these people who write about productivity make everything so complicated. We don't need books or systems for this. Just read and watch what interests you and ignore everything else.
- jug 3y ago
CollinEMac 3y ago
There's some irony in the writer recommending books and videos to help with digital hoarding. I now have two more books sitting in my Amazon wishlist. On another note, I recently started using Obsidian and it really is as good as they say. I also use Remember The Milk for my daily TODOs.
- paulpauper 3y ago
  It reads like borderline marketing spam, something from the 2012-2016 era when productivity apps and gurus were all the rave , like Tim Ferris and Neil Patel and such
deleted 3y ago
[deleted]
wslh 3y ago
Thankfully we have HN that could kill your attention OR narrow your attention to fewer items. Beyond the focus issue there is a subset: the mesmerizing issue. There is an overwhelming incredible stuff on Internet that is enough to spend your lifetime. It would be easier if the information available was only for trivial distraction.
FigurativeVoid 3y ago
I think that we are being overwhelmed and it hurts us in more ways than our creativity. We are moving through the world in constant distraction. Until recently, when I was doing something around the house, no matter what, I was listening to music, podcasts, or books. I found that it seemed like it was taking for ever for me to do the simplest tasks. After a while... I figured that I must be going slower because I was always doing two things at once. After a few weeks of doing the dishes without ear buds in, I don't think I'll ever go back. I am not able to focus better and get things done. If you are like I was, and you are always inundated with some distraction, try moving through the world without it.
- coffeebeqn 3y ago
  I think it’s not unlike other addictions. You end up using constant external stimulus to not have to deal with whatever is actually bothering you in your life. The concept I was missing basically since smartphones become a thing was this thing called “solitude”
  - FigurativeVoid 3y ago
    https://eriktorenberg.substack.com/p/on-solitude https://eriktorenberg.substack.com/p/on-solitude was a post that was on HN a while ago. It basically agrees. We get some good things from solitude.
  - Apocryphon 3y ago
    Before the internet I was just reading a lot. I'd like to get back to using books as a balm.
- wintogreen74 3y ago
  >> because I was always doing two things at once I think this is part of it; aside from basic system 1 stuff (like breathing) we're actually flipping between 2 or more things constantly. Sure I can listen to music while I go for a walk, but I spend 2 minutes getting set up before I start, and I slow down whenever I need to change anything.
hownottowrite 3y ago
Most people trying to be creative in the business world should read Orbiting the Giant Hairball. It’ll get you going.
catchmeifyoucan 3y ago
I agree with the title, but I wish the solution was less about a second brain and more about giving ourselves space. The past week I've been getting burned in meetings, and just a whole lot of "to-do". And I'm just not as creative anymore because I don't have the room to be bored and ponder (which I like)
- wintogreen74 3y ago
  Boredom is such a great motivator. The problem is kids are never bored anymore (for real; I'm sure they still say they are...)
  - deleted 3y ago
    [deleted]
  - yamazakiwi 3y ago
    Maybe that's just for children? I'm bored everyday at work and it never motivates me. Boredom drives me towards the easy things just to kill time. The outcome is usually waiting for the cause of boredom to end. (Work)
    - BagelGuy 3y ago
      Boredom + Freedom = Creativity.
      - yamazakiwi 3y ago
        I see, the missing link is not age, it's freedom. I myself do a bad job of being bored, even when freedom is provided. My reaction is reinforced due to how often I am compelled to deal with boredom without freedom.
        datameta 3y ago
        I second this very much so. Even if I have the extra time due to working from home, I usually don't feel free enough during work hours to get engrossed in a hobby or side project. I just seek escape in the form of cheap temporary entertainment.
theshrike79 3y ago
You know all the huge scientists and mathematicians etc from ye olden days? They spent years on that stuff, mostly just meandering around the world or their country, letting their brain ruminate on the issue at hand slowly. They had actual hobbies that weren't related to their craft and a bunch of free time. Very rarely were major discoveries done by working long days and just forcing it.
- nine_zeros 3y ago
  The long hour days stuff is just corporations/institutions forcing thinkers to work like factory workers.
frontman1988 3y ago
Da vinci used to stare at a wall for hours to aid his creative process. Our brains are full of information, but we don't spend enough time processing it.
nologic01 3y ago
wow, didn't realise tiktok is 50x youtube... should I sign up and catch up on any things I've been missing on that platform > The sheer volume of content is overwhelming > The mental effort required to evaluate and choose between many options can be exhausting > Saving these links in a digital vault where they’ll most likely be forgotten forever The diagnosis seems correct. We all experience this digital overabundance. Abundance is in principle a good thing. But obviously there is gross mismatch with the tools we have to manage this flow. You can overwater your plants and drown them. But I am underwhelmed by the remedies proposed. My gut feeling is that nothing less than a ground-up reworking of the personal computing infrastructure will be required to restore an equilibrium that accomodates the nature of our information processing capacities. We need to go back to the Engelbartian concepts of augmentation but drastically updated for the vast knowledge we have acquired in the meantime. And of course this has to be done in a context that is seriously human centric. The people that will build this infrastructure need to somehow have their incentives and interests aligned with the average person. They should not see the dazed and confused online masses as product to be trapped and exploited.
johnrob 3y ago
Fair question: if the world is already overloaded with compelling content, do we still need to be creative? Maybe the core issue is not (directly, at least) the creativity loss, but rather the struggle against FOMO.
- ntlk 3y ago
  Are you assuming that the goal for being creative is to produce content? Because often being creative is just a nice way to spend time while being alive, regardless of whether it produces any output.
goodroot 3y ago
These posts pop up every now and then. Too much rationalism in this approach for sense. But I get it, it's difficult to sell letters when you're warning people against reading letters. As a lay student of Buddhism, there's a much more simple and effective route. Meditate. A clean, crisp, quiet break into your own internal fortress of solitude. Curating as a means of establishing a creative sandbox makes sense to me, when the creative process opens. But concentration and focus is a skill and it can be developed. Trying to develop it through consumption is very difficult and counter-intuitive. Your own internal world can surpass any notebook. Have you heard of the Method of Loci? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Method_of_loci https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Method_of_loci It's applied meditational creative construction, it's been used by Grand Master memory champions, and it's all inside. Even if you do not apply the projector in your mind to such purposes, simply meditating can make much of this process subconscious. You do less, think less and yet remember and "receive" more.
- Llamamoe 3y ago
  > Your own internal world can surpass any notebook. If you have exceptional executive function and memory, but a lot of people don't.
- swah 3y ago
  Meditating is much easier if you do it before opening your browser to find out about hospitals being bombed 4000km from your place, though. I'd still advocate for limiting consumption first...
mberning 3y ago
At some point you have to come to grips with the fact that you aren’t as motivated, creative, or smart as you think you are. And it isn’t burnout, add, or any other reason stopping you.
deleted 3y ago
[deleted]
karaterobot 3y ago
> First and foremost, creators are curators. That seems like an overstatement. Foremost? Johnson said that a writer may turn over half a library to make one book, but this article doesn't talk about doing anything with your collection after you've curated it. The creative act referred to in this article seems to be the curating itself. That's fine as far as it goes; curation is a form of creativity. But I'd say creators, broadly, are first and foremost people who make stuff, not people who curate other stuff. If you're too overwhelmed by stuff to make anything yourself, you've probably seen plenty already. Maybe shut off the firehose and try working on something before deciding lack of curation is the problem you face. This feels a bit like the impulse that tells you the reason you can't get any writing done is because you need to clean your office first.
- thejorgemedina 3y ago
  Hey, the author here :) Curation is only the first step of the framework i'm building called The Creative Flywheel. So you're right. It is not enough. But the sentence you highlight means creators are very good curators. They learn from other creators and carefully select their sources of inspiration, then they ideate on their own, and finally create. The cycle goes Curation > Ideation > Creation > Distribution. That article is only dedicated to the first step. But I have another talking about the blueprint of creativity where I go over the 4 in less detail.
nradov 3y ago
You're not lacking creativity, you're sleep deprived.
renegade-otter 3y ago
I recently wrote about something rather related, and most importantly, how we can fight back (perhaps): "Getting our focus back" https://renegadeotter.com/2023/08/24/getting-your-focus-back.html https://renegadeotter.com/2023/08/24/getting-your-focus-back...
paulpauper 3y ago
Sorta off-topic, but the submitted Substack link only got a single 'like' on Substack an a single comment despite being viral here, top of front page of HN with 107 points. If that is good enough for only a single 'like', what does it take to get dozens of likes, as I often see on other Substack blogs? or many comments? A huge PR campaign? Being famous? What hope does anyone have to make money or success at writing when virality leads to no readers?
- thejorgemedina 3y ago
  Hey Paul! I'm the author :) I think it has to do with the fact that you can't like if you're not a substack user. Also, I don't think it reached the top because most people agreed with it, maybe the opposite. So they might be reading (i got around 7k views on it) but not liking it haha
silcoon 3y ago
> The sheer volume of content is overwhelming and few paragraphs later the post becomes another marketing content with affiliate links and so on. The web is getting flooded with this type of spam content and this post is part of the overwhelming. I came to HN to avoid being spammed with unwanted marketing things about this app or that app and I find this article as #1 in the homepage. Marketing camouflaged as cultural content.
deleted 3y ago
[deleted]

187 points by alexzeitler 3y ago

- "But the single most effective thing you can do to ensure the value of your feeds, is to start blocking the content you don’t align with." Then you risk of closing yourself into bubble. I prefer to not use any kind of feeds manipulated by algorithms. No social networks at all. Instead use RSS.

alisson_dover 3y ago

Creativity requires space. Can't remember who said it (paraphrasing): dedicate at least 4 hours to the process, you might end up being creative for only 10 minutes of that time.

Karstographer 3y ago
I'm sure it's been said many times, but John Cleese did provide a memorable talk on it [1] and particularly touched on the relation to stress. And if anyone feels like they have troubles with stress/anxiety, Robert Sapolsky provides some great insight into how and why it affects health overall [2]. I'm not sure if Sapolsky's material will help reduce stress, but it was pretty entertaining along the way. Two great speeches that it would be a shame to lose. Now, what was that about keeping up with digital clutter? [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pb5oIIPO62g https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pb5oIIPO62g [2] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D9H9qTdserM https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D9H9qTdserM
hobs 3y ago
Generally I find boredom or challenge is a prerequisite for my creativity to start percolating - but overdosing on boredom yields more creativity (to stave it off), while overdosing on challenges generally leads me to burnout.
- alisson_dover 3y ago
  That's a good observation. I tend to over-index on challenges and often end up distracting myself for long enough to completely drain myself of all energy to be creative.
m463 3y ago
I find much creativity when I am awake but haven't gotten out of bed in the morning. (I do need my phone to capture it)

robg 3y ago

This 1000 times. Why is it that we don’t optimize for brain power? The brain lacking sleep and under stress is designed to survive, not thrive. Our strongest muscle is weakest when we need it most to prioritize survival.

Almondsetat 3y ago
>Why is it that we don’t optimize for brain power? who is "we"? how many people do you know who are informed on the matter? how can you expect society to revolve around this if it's still mostly overlooked?

sosodev 3y ago

This seems like nonsense. The author claims that we're overwhelmed by the volume of content we consume and that's why we can't be creative. So the suggested solution is to do more work to consume content? That doesn't make any sense to me.

thejorgemedina 3y ago
Hey, author here :) Having enlightening experiences of learning requires effort. Anybody who wants to learn and thrive on any topic needs to make an effort to curate the sources he's consuming. That's not new. It certainly isn't an internet thing. We've always paid to be entertained and educated. And money is earned with effort. When content wasn't as abundant, you needed to be selective with what you wanted to consume. You developed a taste, and continued to consume that type of content, hence basically becoming a curator of whatever your interest was. The problem now, with all content being free, is that we pay with our time. And time is our most valuable currency. So yes. Even though there's an initial effort curve to build a Second brain (or any other system you like), the end result is a much better internet experience.
wizzledonker 3y ago
This was my impression as well. I think people actually feeling burnt out creatively might read this and get a forlorn feeling that what is required is more work, and then go straight back to mindlessly scrolling
maitkin 3y ago
Exactly right, this article wrongly imagines we can treat the problem by exercising the problem. Learn to sit still and give your deep mind a chance to be present, this might lead to actual creativity.
babblingfish 3y ago
Agreed, these people who write about productivity make everything so complicated. We don't need books or systems for this. Just read and watch what interests you and ignore everything else.
jug 3y ago

CollinEMac 3y ago

There's some irony in the writer recommending books and videos to help with digital hoarding. I now have two more books sitting in my Amazon wishlist. On another note, I recently started using Obsidian and it really is as good as they say. I also use Remember The Milk for my daily TODOs.

paulpauper 3y ago
It reads like borderline marketing spam, something from the 2012-2016 era when productivity apps and gurus were all the rave , like Tim Ferris and Neil Patel and such

deleted 3y ago

[deleted]

wslh 3y ago

Thankfully we have HN that could kill your attention OR narrow your attention to fewer items. Beyond the focus issue there is a subset: the mesmerizing issue. There is an overwhelming incredible stuff on Internet that is enough to spend your lifetime. It would be easier if the information available was only for trivial distraction.

FigurativeVoid 3y ago

I think that we are being overwhelmed and it hurts us in more ways than our creativity. We are moving through the world in constant distraction. Until recently, when I was doing something around the house, no matter what, I was listening to music, podcasts, or books. I found that it seemed like it was taking for ever for me to do the simplest tasks. After a while... I figured that I must be going slower because I was always doing two things at once. After a few weeks of doing the dishes without ear buds in, I don't think I'll ever go back. I am not able to focus better and get things done. If you are like I was, and you are always inundated with some distraction, try moving through the world without it.

coffeebeqn 3y ago
I think it’s not unlike other addictions. You end up using constant external stimulus to not have to deal with whatever is actually bothering you in your life. The concept I was missing basically since smartphones become a thing was this thing called “solitude”
- FigurativeVoid 3y ago
  https://eriktorenberg.substack.com/p/on-solitude https://eriktorenberg.substack.com/p/on-solitude was a post that was on HN a while ago. It basically agrees. We get some good things from solitude.
- Apocryphon 3y ago
  Before the internet I was just reading a lot. I'd like to get back to using books as a balm.
wintogreen74 3y ago
>> because I was always doing two things at once I think this is part of it; aside from basic system 1 stuff (like breathing) we're actually flipping between 2 or more things constantly. Sure I can listen to music while I go for a walk, but I spend 2 minutes getting set up before I start, and I slow down whenever I need to change anything.

hownottowrite 3y ago

Most people trying to be creative in the business world should read Orbiting the Giant Hairball. It’ll get you going.

catchmeifyoucan 3y ago

I agree with the title, but I wish the solution was less about a second brain and more about giving ourselves space. The past week I've been getting burned in meetings, and just a whole lot of "to-do". And I'm just not as creative anymore because I don't have the room to be bored and ponder (which I like)

wintogreen74 3y ago
Boredom is such a great motivator. The problem is kids are never bored anymore (for real; I'm sure they still say they are...)
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]
- yamazakiwi 3y ago
  Maybe that's just for children? I'm bored everyday at work and it never motivates me. Boredom drives me towards the easy things just to kill time. The outcome is usually waiting for the cause of boredom to end. (Work)
  - BagelGuy 3y ago
    Boredom + Freedom = Creativity.
    - yamazakiwi 3y ago
      I see, the missing link is not age, it's freedom. I myself do a bad job of being bored, even when freedom is provided. My reaction is reinforced due to how often I am compelled to deal with boredom without freedom.
      - datameta 3y ago
        I second this very much so. Even if I have the extra time due to working from home, I usually don't feel free enough during work hours to get engrossed in a hobby or side project. I just seek escape in the form of cheap temporary entertainment.

theshrike79 3y ago

You know all the huge scientists and mathematicians etc from ye olden days? They spent years on that stuff, mostly just meandering around the world or their country, letting their brain ruminate on the issue at hand slowly. They had actual hobbies that weren't related to their craft and a bunch of free time. Very rarely were major discoveries done by working long days and just forcing it.

nine_zeros 3y ago
The long hour days stuff is just corporations/institutions forcing thinkers to work like factory workers.

frontman1988 3y ago

Da vinci used to stare at a wall for hours to aid his creative process. Our brains are full of information, but we don't spend enough time processing it.

nologic01 3y ago

wow, didn't realise tiktok is 50x youtube... should I sign up and catch up on any things I've been missing on that platform > The sheer volume of content is overwhelming > The mental effort required to evaluate and choose between many options can be exhausting > Saving these links in a digital vault where they’ll most likely be forgotten forever The diagnosis seems correct. We all experience this digital overabundance. Abundance is in principle a good thing. But obviously there is gross mismatch with the tools we have to manage this flow. You can overwater your plants and drown them. But I am underwhelmed by the remedies proposed. My gut feeling is that nothing less than a ground-up reworking of the personal computing infrastructure will be required to restore an equilibrium that accomodates the nature of our information processing capacities. We need to go back to the Engelbartian concepts of augmentation but drastically updated for the vast knowledge we have acquired in the meantime. And of course this has to be done in a context that is seriously human centric. The people that will build this infrastructure need to somehow have their incentives and interests aligned with the average person. They should not see the dazed and confused online masses as product to be trapped and exploited.

johnrob 3y ago

Fair question: if the world is already overloaded with compelling content, do we still need to be creative? Maybe the core issue is not (directly, at least) the creativity loss, but rather the struggle against FOMO.

ntlk 3y ago
Are you assuming that the goal for being creative is to produce content? Because often being creative is just a nice way to spend time while being alive, regardless of whether it produces any output.

goodroot 3y ago

These posts pop up every now and then. Too much rationalism in this approach for sense. But I get it, it's difficult to sell letters when you're warning people against reading letters. As a lay student of Buddhism, there's a much more simple and effective route. Meditate. A clean, crisp, quiet break into your own internal fortress of solitude. Curating as a means of establishing a creative sandbox makes sense to me, when the creative process opens. But concentration and focus is a skill and it can be developed. Trying to develop it through consumption is very difficult and counter-intuitive. Your own internal world can surpass any notebook. Have you heard of the Method of Loci? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Method_of_loci https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Method_of_loci It's applied meditational creative construction, it's been used by Grand Master memory champions, and it's all inside. Even if you do not apply the projector in your mind to such purposes, simply meditating can make much of this process subconscious. You do less, think less and yet remember and "receive" more.

Llamamoe 3y ago
> Your own internal world can surpass any notebook. If you have exceptional executive function and memory, but a lot of people don't.
swah 3y ago
Meditating is much easier if you do it before opening your browser to find out about hospitals being bombed 4000km from your place, though. I'd still advocate for limiting consumption first...

mberning 3y ago

At some point you have to come to grips with the fact that you aren’t as motivated, creative, or smart as you think you are. And it isn’t burnout, add, or any other reason stopping you.

deleted 3y ago

[deleted]

karaterobot 3y ago

> First and foremost, creators are curators. That seems like an overstatement. Foremost? Johnson said that a writer may turn over half a library to make one book, but this article doesn't talk about doing anything with your collection after you've curated it. The creative act referred to in this article seems to be the curating itself. That's fine as far as it goes; curation is a form of creativity. But I'd say creators, broadly, are first and foremost people who make stuff, not people who curate other stuff. If you're too overwhelmed by stuff to make anything yourself, you've probably seen plenty already. Maybe shut off the firehose and try working on something before deciding lack of curation is the problem you face. This feels a bit like the impulse that tells you the reason you can't get any writing done is because you need to clean your office first.

thejorgemedina 3y ago
Hey, the author here :) Curation is only the first step of the framework i'm building called The Creative Flywheel. So you're right. It is not enough. But the sentence you highlight means creators are very good curators. They learn from other creators and carefully select their sources of inspiration, then they ideate on their own, and finally create. The cycle goes Curation > Ideation > Creation > Distribution. That article is only dedicated to the first step. But I have another talking about the blueprint of creativity where I go over the 4 in less detail.

nradov 3y ago

You're not lacking creativity, you're sleep deprived.

renegade-otter 3y ago

I recently wrote about something rather related, and most importantly, how we can fight back (perhaps): "Getting our focus back" https://renegadeotter.com/2023/08/24/getting-your-focus-back.html https://renegadeotter.com/2023/08/24/getting-your-focus-back...

paulpauper 3y ago

Sorta off-topic, but the submitted Substack link only got a single 'like' on Substack an a single comment despite being viral here, top of front page of HN with 107 points. If that is good enough for only a single 'like', what does it take to get dozens of likes, as I often see on other Substack blogs? or many comments? A huge PR campaign? Being famous? What hope does anyone have to make money or success at writing when virality leads to no readers?

thejorgemedina 3y ago
Hey Paul! I'm the author :) I think it has to do with the fact that you can't like if you're not a substack user. Also, I don't think it reached the top because most people agreed with it, maybe the opposite. So they might be reading (i got around 7k views on it) but not liking it haha

silcoon 3y ago

> The sheer volume of content is overwhelming and few paragraphs later the post becomes another marketing content with affiliate links and so on. The web is getting flooded with this type of spam content and this post is part of the overwhelming. I came to HN to avoid being spammed with unwanted marketing things about this app or that app and I find this article as #1 in the homepage. Marketing camouflaged as cultural content.

deleted 3y ago

[deleted]