Cureosities | Books, Vol.1: Creativity
There are so many books in the world about creativity. I haven’t read most of them, so there are likely hundreds that I could add to this list, but since I can only discuss my own experiences, I’m writing about a few of the books I’ve leaned into and learned from. These books all discuss creativity and innovation but are also as much about the psychology of what we go through when we are being creative, the tendency to focus on a “win” and the importance of deflecting that inclination to focus on the overall arch of our body of work.
House and yard master plan process drawings.
The Rise: Creativity, the Gift of Failure, and the Search for Mastery - Sarah Lewis
This book is a study on creativity in a mental and emotional way, the psychology around the creative process and the methods one can use to develop a mindset that is more open to and forgiving of creativity and the necessary failures that bring innovation. This book was one of the first that I encountered that focused on the concept of failure as an important part of innovation. Dr Lewis describes failure as “blankness” which I find far less judgmental or loaded, so there’s a part of me that resists this substitute for failure because it’s always been such a bad thing in my mind. She also discusses the concept of creativity as a learned skill, that the more you make, in whatever field, the better your work will be. In addition, she emphasizes the need to focus on the concept of mastery rather than success. Sucess implies a singular moment of outside approval and celebration, a repeatable moment in time; mastery is focusing on developing comprehensive knowledge and skills in a particular area, a body of work. The difference between these two concepts is what stimies or supports innovation and creative thought. If something was successful, the inclination may be to do it again and again, but there are diminishing returns. When something in a creative realm is a “success”, its usually related to its newness of idea, but if that idea is then repeated, it is no longer as innovative or well received. Mastery, on the other hand, has no end goal. Its searching and developing ideas in the context of a lifetime’s body of work. Each individual work is part of a greater whole and can be learned from, celebrated for what it is, and then built upon in subsequent works.
This book is a joy to read. Its not particularly long, but it is packed with beautiful thoughts and perspectives on the difficulties of creativity, innovation and rising after failure. It almost reads like a poem and is full of stories of the “near wins” that led to innovation, discovery and mastery.
The Infinite Game - Simon Sinek
Simon Sinek is one of my favorite thinkers. He’s the guy who developed and promoted the idea of “Start with Why”, which is also a great book that relates to innovation. The Infinite Game hasn’t gotten quite as much press, at least that I’ve seen, but it was a brain changer for me. I read this after I’d read The Rise, so I was primed for the ideas of big goals versus individual wins, and that is the bulk of this book. Think of a game you know - soccer, chess, Mario Kart - in all of these, the players know the rules, the players are fixed at the beginning, there is a known timeline, and there is a clear winner. These are all examples of finite games.
The concept in game theory of an infinite game is the players don’t know the rules, the participants can come and go, there is no defined timeline, and there is no clear winner or loser. Think of life, there is no “winner” of life. We’re all going along, doing our best, and while some people may have more or less success, it’s a continual path with many participants coming and going and people defining their own rules of play. In a finite game, you look at the other participants as on your team or adversaries and you are working toward a specific end goal. In taking an infinite mindset, you look at the other participants in your field as running on parallel paths, all working toward their own “just cause” or purpose that will make the world a better place. Obviously you want to beat your opponent in your chess game, but in life? In business? A “Just Cause”, an audacious goal that will likely always be out of reach but in striving toward it you make the world better, gives focus to purpose, which Sinek suggests is very important in shifting from importance from “I won” to “let’s improve the world”.
Another thought of Sinek’s is the concept of the “worthy rival”, another person or entity that you respect that is also pushing the boundaries of what your industry or field knows. In finding and knowing your respected contemporaries, respecting them rather than cutting them down, you’ll learn and grow together in your own pursuits. There’s no scarcity of success when you’re working toward innovation. The goal shouldn’t be about outside competition, it’s about internal growth, mastery and valuing the overall body of work.
There’s a lot to be taken from Sinek’s body of work as well as that of his worthy rival’s, Adam Grant. There seems to be a shift in the intellectual/academic approach to business leadership led by these two and others that is pushing toward a more vulnerable, thoughtful and humble leadership that is focused on far more than the individual gains to be had with a business. Whether that takes hold in actual business remains to be seen, but I’m hopeful we’re going in that direction.
A Technique for Producing Ideas - James Webb Young
This one is a very quick read, its more of an essay than a book. Its a bit odd and written from a bit of a “high brow, advertising exec from the Mad Men days” perspective….because it was literally written by an advertising exec in 1965. You have to filter out some of the patriarchal persona, but its not pervasive, and its actually a really concise, interesting recipe for being creative. I find it interesting because it outlines the highlights of my process pretty well. It’s a bit simplistic, especially when translating it to architecture and design, where there might be layers upon layers of need for creativity, but for the process of developing a conceptual basis or idea, it’s pretty spot on. It also only takes about 45 minutes to read, so not an extreme time investment.