Creative Process

Possibilities vs. Pragmatics

We’re in the midst of a blog series called Battle Lines in which we’re looking at some of the places in which artists draw arbitrary and sometimes destructive battle lines in our creative lives. In the last part of the series we discussed the battle line Proactive vs. Reactive and how we can often slip into a victim mindset, especially within an organizational setting. In this part we’re going to look at how easy it is to slip into pragmatics thinking as our primary reaction to creating solutions.

“Our aspirations are our possibilities.” - Samuel Johnson

I have an extreme aversion to “psychobabble.” This is the kind of talk that involves self-important sounding words that temporarily instill a sense of comfort, but don’t really inspire change over the long-term. Perhaps one of the reasons I’m averse to this kind of language is because I’ve so often heard it tossed around in “creative” circles. We somehow think that if we could only get our thoughts in the right place, everything else will follow. While I don’t doubt that a proper mindset is critical to healthy, sustained creating, it is also important for us to follow that with engaged activity and discipline. We must work.

But for some of us, this is where the going gets…what’s the word….yeah…tough. We have been met with disappointment, rejection or unfairness in our organizational life and as a result we have begun to limit our thinking to only that which is “practical” or likely to get “through.” For others of us, we’re not really certain of who we are and what we have to offer the world, so we tend to stick close to the rails and never venture out into the open. (Sometimes this is due to a fear of failure, but just as often it is because of a fear of success - can we sustain the success once we’ve achieved it?)

So the battle line with which we must struggle is this: how can we push pragmatics farther into the creative process so that we can dwell more on possibilities? How can we avoid making a decision too early so that we have more time to generate the right idea?

How can shun our fears and choose possibilities over pragmatics?

So often we’re unaware that this is even an issue. We move through our days solving problems, creating art that’s acceptable, earning our “keep.” But the fire in our gut has extinguished. There’s no longer a sustained curiosity for our work. We’re cranking it out, but we’re no longer enjoying the process. For people who tend to lean toward the “conceptual” end of the spectrum, this can often be attributed to a lack of an answer to the “why” questions.

“Why are we doing this? Why is this significant? Why am I involved in this project?”

Instead, we’ve grown accustomed to running with only answers to the “what” questions. (Which mostly involve concrete answers about the product itself.) We must recognize and make peace with the reality that this is the way that organizations are wired. Organizations are about the “bottom line” and always should be - that’s why they exist and there’s nothing wrong with it. The real tension emerges when the organization continues to demand something that we can no longer give.

In order to embrace possibilities over pragmatics, we need to change the stakes of the game. We have to decide what we’re really playing for. We cannot stand on the fence between, “the recognition is my reward” and “engagement in the process is my reward.” We must choose a side or we will live fragmented lives. We must live within the realities that organizations create, but with the deeper understanding that our identity is not determined by what is accepted or rejected by them. The org does not define us, rather we define our work by how we choose to engage.

If we immediately think pragmatics when given a task, we are forfeiting the creative mandate. If we default to what’s easiest or most obvious, then there is a good chance that fear has taken root in our lives. And this is the beginning of creative death.

Here are a few questions to help us wrestle through this:
1. Do you often default to your first idea when working on a project? Why? (It’s OK if your answer is “because it’s always brilliant.” We’ll address that later…)
2. Do you find yourself using, “yeah…but…” language in meetings or ideation sessions? How about in your personal creating?
3. Are there lists of projects you’d love to tackle but haven’t started for seemingly practical reasons? What are those reasons?

4. Are you able to enjoy the creative process even if your favorite idea is not ultimately “acted upon?”

We’re going to continue wrestling through some of these creative “battle lines” over the next few weeks. Again, the goal here is simply to unearth some of the hidden stuff that we’re often too busy to notice. The hard work…your part…is figuring out how to act on it.

In the next part of the series we’ll be tackling the arbitrary line we draw between play and work.

Series Navigation

Play vs. Work»

Tags: battle lines, creating, ideas, possibilities


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