Creative isolation

“How Do People Get New Ideas?” by Isaac Asimov is one of the most influential essays I’ve ever read. It tries to analyze why creative individuals have these seemingly random sparks of inspiration where they somehow manage to see the similarities between two very disconnected things. It’s quite an insightful look into the human mind and how creativity “works”.

One thing that struck me in the essay is how the presence of others can hamper creativity. In Asimov’s worldview, creativity happens in the person’s head and it must be free of any outside judgement until the spark happens. I find this to be in stark contrast with how those in the creative arts work in the startup culture of today — working in large open offices, sitting side by side, and constantly interrupting each other for feedback or critique.

In an environment like this, our minds never quite get into the headspace where it is ready to make disparate connections between things and it becomes very difficult to clear the mind. As much as we’d like to think that we’re being more open and collaborative with open-office layouts, the end result can be quite the opposite. This is likely where the stereotype of the designer with headphones in 24×7 comes from. That kind of isolation from one’s own surroundings is frequently a necessity for creativity.

Additionally, this also affects how groups critique each others’ work. Asimov himself says that everyone in attendance at a session must be willing to sound foolish and listen to others sounding foolish. This expectation rarely gets set at design reviews. Instead, we reluctantly show each other what we’ve been working on and hope to get some useful feedback on the latest iteration of the design. If everyone was willing to sound dumb while speaking and making suggestions, the group as a collective comes up with more creative output.

Another “requirement” for creativity that Asimov cites is being quirky. It’s those that aren’t afraid to break norms and embrace nonconformity that end up being unusual enough to have slightly offbeat ideas which end up working. The person must not be afraid of judgement, especially of society as a whole. Eccentricity is good, which inevitably leads designers to having quirky tastes.

I find the contrast between the experts’ opinion of where creativity comes from interesting when juxtaposed with how we currently practice the creative arts in the digital world. There are also many similarities between Asimov’s views and how we currently do it as well — such as having informal lounge spaces in offices and creating a space for natural, spontaneous conversation — which seem to be a step in the right direction.

We can’t, however, ignore the heavy emphasis on isolation when creativity is required. In today’s digital tech culture, designers need to be creative on-demand, during business hours, as clients demand it, on a strict timeline, while working in an open office, constantly gathering feedback and iterating on designs, updating and re-working it as necessary. Doing all this can often result in a frenzied rush to get things done where the emphasis on delivering the work starts to take precedence over doing creative work. By analyzing Asimov’s thoughts on where creativity actually comes from, I think we can all learn a thing or two about how to structure not only our work environments and work habits around solo-work, but also how to budget our time and mental resources during business hours better.