Interlude - Merlin Man on Creativity
Posted on October 11, 2010In my last post I said that my next post would be "Solve your 'don't know what to write' problem forever", and I am still on track to put that out on Wednesday - it is a post I'm really looking forward to writing. But sometimes I come across stuff that I think is relevant, and perhaps worth sharing.
For any blogger, the issue of creativity is a big one, especially if your blog is a front for a company, a way to get freelance work or somehow relates to how you make your money.
This video is by Merlin Mann, someone I guess you are probably familiar with, and someone who's blog 43 Folders I love visiting. The video is a little old, but I only saw it for the first time today, and it is certainly still very relevant.
Merlin is one of those people I just find myself really liking - he makes videos with his hair standing up and unshaven, but he is so interesting and has great insight into what he chats about.
On his about page he has this bit:
"We hope very much that you find things here that will help you do and make the things that matter to you, but 43 Folders is no replacement for actual work."
I love that - wish I had thought of it first!
About the Video
Every Monday afternoon I try to read blogs and/or watch videos that I find inspirational or motivating - it is a kind of "get the week started right" bit of time for me, and I take it really seriously. So, this videos was one of my treats for the day.
"…how people were fixated on tools and frameworks and all the stuff…" is a line early in the video - discussing the fact that so many of us who want to be creative spend a lot of time reading books about becoming creative, about getting ideas, about motivating ourselves to do the stuff - and get caught up comparing the 'tools' instead of getting down and doing the stuff.
Merlin basically says something like - people who actually make stuff aren't so caught up with all the little things - they get on with it and make stuff. They have their ways - their little tools they like, but their focus is on doing it.
I loved the bit where he discusses parenting - "there are patterns you can learn, but you are solving different problems every day" - this is so true in parenting but it applies very well to the creative process.
"When you are a creative person, having creative ideas is not the problem, making something awesome with those ideas is the really difficult bit". I'm always somewhat surprised at how many people say "I don't know what to write on my blog" and things like that - my problem, and the problem for many others I think, is actually collecting the ideas properly and doing the work to make those posts worth while.
So, if you have some time, check out the video. As always, I would love to hear some thoughts on it in the comments.
If you don't have time or aren't that interested, I'll have my next post up soon - I think it will be a good one.
Of course I think that the video is very relevant to crafting meaningful blogs.
