Creativity: Theory and Practice

Regardless of whether or not we’re formally making art, we are all living as artists. We perceive, filter, and collect data, then curate an experience for ourselves and others based on this information set. Whether we do this consciously or unconsciously, by the mere fact of being alive, we are active participants in the ongoing process of creation

Data collection is inherently creative. Depending on the data you choose to collect from the world, you can begin to see the world from a different perspective. Being a data collector means observing the world with curiosity.

Try writing about why the work is important, or spend some time reflecting on times in the past where you’ve felt most connected to it.

Another key aspect of idea generation is to embrace variance. Research shows that, to find good novel ideas, we likely have to come up with many bad novel ideas because most new ideas are pretty bad. Fortunately, we are good at filtering out low-quality ideas, so if we can generate novel ideas quickly and at low cost, we are more likely to generate