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Why you’re not doing creative work

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Re: Why you’re not doing creative work

#11

Post by em-bee »

danielfoster wrote: post #6

Nice read, but am I only one annoyed by titles like this one? “Why you’re not creative” subtly implies that you should be doing creative work and that if you aren’t, you’re doing something wrong. So many self-help articles on HN in particular seem designed to inspire this sort of guilt trip. Do creative work if you want to. Or don’t. Not everyone has to do everything. The answer to “why you’re not doing creative work…

disagree. the title is not suggesting that you should be doing creative work. it didn't to me. it merely stating that you aren't, and it explains why. it's a statement not a question asking you to explain yourself.

for those who actually do want to do creative work, the article has some good insights, some of which i'll be trying out myself.

Re: Why you’re not doing creative work

#12

Post by bambax »

> If all you had to do was the execution phase of creative work, you’d be able to do it between meetings no problem. But the truly hard, terrible, nasty truth is that you need to do the exploration phase in order to get to the execution phase.

This matches my experience. I finished writing a novel a few months ago. It took me ~2 years, of which very little time was spent actually writing. Gathering information, thinking about the book and day-dreaming took the bulk of the time.

The problem with so-called "exploration" phase is that you don't know what you're doing, you don't know why you're doing it, you don't know where you're going or where your general direction might be. It's not terrifying, it's aimless. It's like being in the desert or in the middle of the sea, with no compass but plenty of food, so there isn't even a sense of urgency to push you forward.

I think it's Duke Ellington who said "I don't need time. What I need is a deadline." Editors breathing on one's neck are underrated.

Re: Why you’re not doing creative work

#13

Post by g-erson »

danielfoster wrote: post #6

Nice read, but am I only one annoyed by titles like this one? “Why you’re not creative” subtly implies that you should be doing creative work and that if you aren’t, you’re doing something wrong. So many self-help articles on HN in particular seem designed to inspire this sort of guilt trip. Do creative work if you want to. Or don’t. Not everyone has to do everything. The answer to “why you’re not doing creative work…

If the article was titled "Why you don't catch many fish", do you think the article would need extra clarification that it shouldn't apply to people who don't like fishing?

Re: Why you’re not doing creative work

#14

Post by ChrisMarshallNY »

I’ve found that my most productive time is in the early morning. I can bang out a lot of high-quality code, and find and fix very difficult bugs, before 10AM.

I find I’m most creative, though, in the afternoon. I often start something in the afternoon, then get it working, the next morning.

Also, I’m constantly in “ship” mode. I write all my code (even the experimental stuff) as if it is shipping code.

That means a lot of “stopping to sand off the rough edges,” as I proceed.

I seem to strike a decent balance between creating and delivering.

Re: Why you’re not doing creative work

#15

Post by 91edec »

ChrisMarshallNY wrote: post #14

I’ve found that my most productive time is in the early morning. I can bang out a lot of high-quality code, and find and fix very difficult bugs, before 10AM. I find I’m most creative , though, in the afternoon. I often start something in the afternoon, then get it working, the next morning. Also, I’m constantly in “ship” mode. I write all my code (even the experimental stuff) as if it is shipping code. That means a…

I'm in the same boat. I've started waking up at 5am to make the most of this. 5-7 work on side projects, 7-11 actual work then after than I'm done for the day.

Re: Why you’re not doing creative work

#17

Post by bregma »

danielfoster wrote: post #6

Nice read, but am I only one annoyed by titles like this one? “Why you’re not creative” subtly implies that you should be doing creative work and that if you aren’t, you’re doing something wrong. So many self-help articles on HN in particular seem designed to inspire this sort of guilt trip. Do creative work if you want to. Or don’t. Not everyone has to do everything. The answer to “why you’re not doing creative work…

The only thing that irks me more than articles (or headlines) written in the second person is articles written in the first person plural.

Re: Why you’re not doing creative work

#18

Post by chrisweekly »

js8 wrote: post #2

I have social anxiety, and I feel like deadlines and public commitments stress me out and distract from actual work. The more work feels like non-committed play and less like social obligation, the better. However, deadlines work best for me if I am genuinely helping someone. So setting an arbitrary deadline is less productive than asking something like "I need that tomorrow because I would like to show that to clien…

The more I feel I "have" to do something, the less I want to.

Re: Why you’re not doing creative work

#19

Post by fddhjjj »

ChrisMarshallNY wrote: post #14

I’ve found that my most productive time is in the early morning. I can bang out a lot of high-quality code, and find and fix very difficult bugs, before 10AM. I find I’m most creative , though, in the afternoon. I often start something in the afternoon, then get it working, the next morning. Also, I’m constantly in “ship” mode. I write all my code (even the experimental stuff) as if it is shipping code. That means a…

A lot of wisdom here. Allow me to just restate and expand on some of your thoughts.

1. If it goes from experimental to ship, you aren’t going to go back and make it shipshape.

2. Sanding time is meditation on the product. As I rework, I’m revisiting the code and design at multiple levels.

3. Before 10am is the old programmers 2am. It’s quiet. The hustle and interruptions of the day haven’t begun.

Re: Why you’re not doing creative work

#20

Post by plutonorm »

As someone who is creative not by choice but by inescapable genetic predisposition:

The creative phase takes a lot of energy, it constantly runs in the background, grinding out the possible from the impossible.

If you go out of your way to take on another task unrelated to your day job - you are going to feel the pain. And your performance at work is going to drop.

Because the uncomfortable truth is that creative work is like a background task constantly running in the brain. And that saps up resources and removes brain power from your run of the mill tasks.

I can feel when a creative process has ended because the fuzzy veil over the world lifts and I can suddenly see more clearly. The resources that were tied up in designing a compressive sensing camera or a new lenticular screen design or a new physical theory of the universe are suddenly released and it's a relief.

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