How to deal with the fickleness of our human creativity.

Photo by Biljana Martinić

This is not the article I wanted to write today.

A few days ago I had an idea for a really good article. Then I promptly forgot what it was. Frustrated, I tried to bring it back from the subconscious from where it came. At some point yesterday I'd accepted that the idea had left me. If or when I was to think of it again, it would have nothing to do that flitting moment of inspiration.

Then very early this morning I remembered.

I was on the very cusp of consciousness. Awake enough to know I'm having real thoughts, but not awake enough to compartmentalise them. Before I was even fully awake I'd forgotten again. I know it was the same idea. I remember remembering, I just couldn't grasp the idea itself.

I grieved for the idea I could of had.

This really made me think how fragile ideas often are. To quote Marcus Aurelius from the movie Gladiator:

There was a dream that was Rome. You could only whisper it. Anything more than a whisper and it would vanish, it was so fragile.

Ideation

I've written at length before about inspiration, and how it almost never strikes when you want it to.

Sure, inspiration can sometimes be induced by going for walks, being in the shower, or lying in the backyard. At least in a full state of consciousness we have some opportunity to write down what comes to mind. But more often then not our best ideas occur to us when we're in a state of hypnagogia. The place between awake and asleep. Sadly for us, we're usually in no state to write anything down. Though it doesn't stop us from trying.

Of all the world's ideas born of hypnagogia, think of how many we've lost.

Fortunately there's a solid process for reliably coming up with solutions, if not conveniently receiving the ideas fully formed in our minds. You guessed it, the design process.

The Old Reliable Design Process

I was asked recently about what I say to potential clients when I have my sales hat on. I was being somewhat facetious at the time, so my response was "I don't, I let me clients say it for me". But then I backed that up with, "I sell them on the design process".

In design, or anything with a component of R&D, you simply can't sell a client a solution. If you don't know the outcome, promising one is only going to lead to a world of pain for both you and your client (which inflicts double the pain on you). You can, however, sell the process that comes up with the solution. That is design.

While the design process may not deliver Earth-shattering lightbulb moments, it will subject the problem to a sustained and rigorous barrage of solutions that are refined slowly and reliably over time. Even in scenarios with impossible conflicting requirements, a partial solution is possible.

It works every time without fail. Even 22 years after graduating I'm still astounded at how well it works. Yet more often than not, the solution you arrive at is not the one you thought you'd get. That's why you can't sell one.

Yet even within the design process itself there are fragile ideas that vanish before we grasp them.

Your Brain as a Fish Tank

We'll never be able to capture every idea that otherwise escapes us. That's part of being fallible and human. And as long as we are human we must accept that a lot of great ideas we have will also be lost to us, or lost on us.

As a creative, a good way to come to terms with it is to think of your brain as a fish tank. Your subconscious mind is the tank, and your conscious mind the pump and filter. Both fixed and free-floating within the tank is all of your knowledge and lived experience. A lot of things you don't know are also in there too; hidden in the corners and under things you know well. The filter sucks all this up for processing - cleaning, oxygenating, etc. Some of it gets captured, the rest is added back into the tank, back into your store of lived experience and knowledge.

We don't get to capture all of what gets processed through our conscious mind. But that doesn't mean it is lost for all time. The combination of elements making up the idea are still floating around in your brain. They will eventually recirculate back through the filter. If the problem remains, there may be opportunity yet to pluck the solution out for action.

Act, or Don't

Yet a brilliant idea is only the beginning. It must be realised to have value. To be turned into a product, or a service, or any solution that offers a benefit and you sell for profit.

However, to capture the idea is one thing, to deliver on it is an order of magnitude more. Especially in the world of physical goods (over software), and especially especially medical devices. For an idea to do good for the world, it often must be shared with others equipped with the skills and knowledge that can help realise it with you. It takes a village to raise a [brain]child. I see lots of good ideas, protected fiercely, that are either never executed, or executed poorly.

Ideas, precious and fragile, squandered.

And yet, not every idea must be acted on. Many would result in nothing but a colossal waste of time or money, or worse. But there is joy to be had in simply having ideas. Relishing the concept of it, and then letting it go. Children do it all the time. It's called play.

There is something very human about existing within our stream of ideas; both good and bad, realised or forgotten. The next time you forget the idea you just had, celebrate the creativity that even allowed it to exist, no matter how fleeting. You never know, you might catch the next one.