In Obscurity
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In Obscurity
1–10 of 35 posts
Re: In Obscurity
#2With the internet, it is now possible for people to find audiences that were effectively unreachable in prior eras. Also note that in many of these cases, the author's self doubt (because of such a lack of audience?) was responsible for the obscurity.
Re: In Obscurity
#3"What would you create even if no one ever saw it?"
Deeply meditative question.
Re: In Obscurity
#4https://news.lettersofnote.com/p/make-your-soul-grow
Here’s an assignment for tonight, and I hope Ms. Lockwood will flunk you if you don’t do it: Write a six line poem, about anything, but rhymed. No fair tennis without a net. Make it as good as you possibly can. But don’t tell anybody what you’re doing. Don’t show it or recite it to anybody, not even your girlfriend or parents or whatever, or Ms. Lockwood. OK?
Tear it up into teeny-weeny pieces, and discard them into widely separated trash recepticals. You will find that you have already been gloriously rewarded for your poem. You have experienced becoming, learned a lot more about what’s inside you, and you have made your soul grow.
Re: In Obscurity
#5> What would you create even if no one ever saw it?
I pretty much do that, every day. I write stuff that I want; whether or not anyone else does, and I don't really bother to don a sandwich board.
The one thing that I did for other folks, has taken off, but it took ten years. One reason was that I didn't spend a whole lot of time, tubthumping.
Re: In Obscurity
#6What miracles and wonders have been worked out by lone wolves, and never recognized by their survivors?
What miracles of computation have been bought and buried by bigger companies who didn't care to compete with smaller fry?
Ultimately it's not relevant until it's realized. Newton may have been 500 years late to the party; but we'll never know and it doesn't matter what others knew the things he explained before him.
Re: In Obscurity
#7“… in an era in which people can’t eat a sandwich, let alone invent Calculus, without tweeting about it. I tweet, therefore I am.”
This is just a bias towards people who make themselves visible. I suspect that self-promoters have existed throughout history and that people laboring on interesting ideas in obscurity exist today.
Re: In Obscurity
#8> What would you create even if no one ever saw it? I pretty much do that, every day. I write stuff that I want; whether or not anyone else does, and I don't really bother to don a sandwich board. The one thing that I did for other folks, has taken off, but it took ten years. One reason was that I didn't spend a whole lot of time, tubthumping.
If you are really creating things no one sees, how come I never see you doing it?
Re: In Obscurity
#9> What would you create even if no one ever saw it? I pretty much do that, every day. I write stuff that I want; whether or not anyone else does, and I don't really bother to don a sandwich board. The one thing that I did for other folks, has taken off, but it took ten years. One reason was that I didn't spend a whole lot of time, tubthumping.
If you are really creating things no one sees, how come I never see you doing it?
You're not looking?
Re: In Obscurity
#10Obscurity, in some ways, is more valuable to the creator than fame (although I loved this piece and I'm glad the author shared it here). Guessing what the audience expects, or seeking external validation, can slowly (or quickly) suck the joy out of the creative process. I interviewed author Michelle Kuo about creativity, and her advice:
“The most important thing I can tell you is to relish writing in obscurity. I feel that I was the happiest as a writer when I was in hiding, when I was invisible, when I was secretly writing, stealing away portions of time at work, or writing on scraps of paper, or forming sentences in my head on the commute. That was a time before I had published really anything and before I even thought my writing would become a book, I was just trying to organize or to create order in my emotional life.”
I wrote a book on creativity with Holloway, and I wanted to share two of my favorite prompts:
Ignore the stats: https://www.holloway.com/g/creative-doing/sections/ignore-th...
Make something you won't ever show anyone else: https://www.holloway.com/g/creative-doing/sections/make-some...