Series: Building Your Creative Practice @ Work
Part 4: Look around you! Finding inspiration everywhere.
This is Part 4 in our series Building Your Creative Practice @ Work. Haven’t read Parts 1 - 3 yet?
In college, my friend Alex introduced our group of friends to Look Around You, a gently weird short video series that parodied the nature and science documentaries of our youth.
Maybe I’m only talking to Millennials and Gen Xers here, but do you remember those kinds of videos? Your 6th grade science teacher would roll out the huge cathode TV on its own special cart and put on something called, like, “Our Amazing World,” and you’d listen to a scientist with absolutely zero media training blandly narrate over footage of chemistry experiments, B-roll chronicling the life cycle of a butterfly, or animations of mitosis and meiosis.
The Look Around You parody videos have the same low-fi academic quality and self-serious narration, and so at first you might not even realize you’re watching anything out of the ordinary. But then the narrator will say something like, “What are birds? We just don’t know.”
And your brain goes, “Right, that’s— Oh...wait...”
Look around you…like really
The idea behind all these kinds of videos—as even the title Look Around You indicates—is that by paying attention to the world around us that we take entirely for granted, we will realize that wonders abound. Miracles of nature and science are occurring nonstop if we have the right perspective. Every cell in our bodies is its own complete ecosystem. Every kettle of water we boil expresses laws of matter that can apply equally to the sun. Every piece of bread that goes moldy reminds us that life is secretly proliferating everywhere at all times, mostly invisible to us.
Not to get all shroomsy on you, but the fact that you’re probably reading this in crisp definition on the screen of a tiny computer that can also, instantly, connect you to anyone else with a tiny computer anywhere in the world because of some contraptions we launched into space is mind-breakingly astonishing. That we are not all consistently agog and paralyzed with awe is somehow a testament to both the limits and potential of our human cognition.
Do we actually know what birds are?!
Inspiration is everywhere
In the pursuit of creativity, which we’ve covered in more “practical” ways in previous newsletters in this series, it's crucial to keep yourself open to the world around you. Inspiration, like the fungi that cause mold on your bread, is lurking unseen everywhere. (Fun image, Shannon.)
But I’m not just talking about inspiration from the natural world, though that’s a whole field of design and inquiry called biomimicry. It goes like this: Want a more aerodynamic train? You could get out your sketchpad, or you could let millions of years of evolution tell you what shapes work best by studying the beaks of birds. (Spoiler: the Common Kingfisher was the winner.)
I’m also not just talking about paying attention to relevant current events, industry trends, and your competitors, though of course those are valid places to look!
Rather, I’m suggesting that we consider looking cross-disciplinarily or into seemingly unrelated categories for inspiration and creative reinvigoration at work. After all, one of the definitions of creativity is the ability to find valuable linkages between disparate ideas.
What movies, books, music, or hobbies do you find yourself drawn to naturally? What recent studies or innovations have you read about, regardless of whether they have anything to do with the working world or your company’s field? What could you nerd out on if given the chance?
And how might any of that apply to your work life?
Clay, not metal
We talked in the previous post in this series about how our subconscious beliefs affect what we think is even possible. That was more about prematurely self-censoring because an idea may not have immediate perceived utility, but I would argue a similar mechanism is at play here:
Our brains, which love shortcuts and efficiency, are casually coding and categorizing things as either “work-related” or “non-work-related.” And when you’re in the thrum of pursuing a to-do list of concrete things that fills every 8+-hour workday in your 40+-hour workweek, it’s both efficient and probably self-protective to disregard all the “non-work-related” things you’ve been consuming and engaging in, no matter how exciting and interesting those things are.
But rather than telling you there’s a step-by-step process to follow for wringing more creativity out of those non-work-related things, I’m proposing a shift in perspective:
Everything could be work-related.
Not in a forcible way! Just in a what-if-the-movies-I-already-like-could-inspire-my-next-presentation kind of way. In a maybe-this-medical-breakthrough-could-inspire-a-campaign kind of way. A perhaps-this-psychology-principle-helps-me-rethink-how-I-give-feedback kind of way. What if more things were under the “For Your Consideration” column in your day-to-day brainstorming?
By softening the borders between disciplines and widening your radar field when you’re in Ideas Mode, you might be surprised to discover what things connect. It’s irrelevant that marine biology has nothing to do with marketing, because they both have to do with you. You are the vessel that’s combining all these various inputs into one (more or less) cohesive experience of the world. And your vessel, with all its chambers and nooks, is made of clay and not metal.
What I’m saying is that our consciousness is porous. The things we consume and engage with—a book, a song, a scientific paper, a trip we take, an argument we have with our spouse, a drawing our kid hands us—permeate and influence us holistically. And when we consider that we’re all, inherently, completely singular collections of influences, drawing on your totality is a way to ensure novelty and uniqueness in your work. Categorizing things as “work-related” or not is perhaps strategic in certain contexts…but hobbling in others.
So for this week, this month, maybe for all of 2024, open yourself to the idea that your inspiration can be hiding any- and everywhere. And if you’re in a position to, ask your team what they’re excited about consuming or doing outside of work. Something new might connect.
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