What’s My Thing?
October 2, 2024
3-Item Status
Current location: Milwaukee, Wisconsin, USA
Reading: The Data Detective by Tim Harford
Listening: Something About You by Hayden James
Quick Notes
Normal: I’m feeling, at this moment, like most of my dials have been set back to “normal” after a month or two of abnormality. Which is good! Knocking out some things I’ve had on my to-do list for a while, and primed to knock out a few more the latter half of this week.
Question: This week’s question is about creativity and making things.
(If you have a moment, reply with your own 3-Item Status and/or Quick Notes about what’s happening in your life.)
What’s My Thing?
When starting a new creative project—any kind of project, from writing a book to designing a new type of semiconductor—one of the better questions to start with is “what do I offer that’s distinct from what’s already available?”
This isn’t always going to be the most vital question: some areas can sustain several near-identical burger joints, for instance, and part of the appeal of some fiction sub-genres is that the books they encompass are similar enough to each other that they all evoke the same general (and desirable) vibe.
In many spaces, though, standing out from what’s come before is important.
In the business world this is often called a “Unique Value Proposition,” but the same concept arguably applies to most creative endeavors, and identifying our personal UVP within applicable spaces requires we ask ourselves some at times difficult questions.
Who am I, what do I offer, what makes me distinct from other people, and what should I make (or do) as a result of that distinctiveness?
What’s my thing?
Further complexifying these questions is the fact that many of us create not solely from the perspective of who and what (and why?) we are, today, but who and what (and why!) we are becoming.
What’s my thing now, and what will my thing be in the future?
We aim to be the best possible version of ourselves, in other words, and that means not just creating the things we can make, today, but aspiring to create what we suspect we’re capable of making, someday, and working that into our plans.
It’s difficult to make plans based on theoretical versions of ourselves, and that theoretical self’s (also theoretical) output—but that’s sort of what we do when we dream up a new project and attempt to make it a reality.
(There’s nothing at all wrong with doing more of the same, by the way, if the same is fulfilling for us and for those on the receiving end of whatever it is we’re making. But ideally there’s some kind of growth baked into these projects and relationships, too, and new projects tend to be so compelling because they offer us something our existing creations and capacities cannot.)
I’ve personally found—when dealing with the analysis paralysis that can sometimes emerge from the “I need to make something that doesn’t exist yet, and also something that I maybe can’t make yet” conundrum—that incorporating a lot of lot of flex, an abundance of wiggle-room, into the earliest blueprints provides me with the best blend of stability and optionality, moving forward.
Keeping things plastic allows me to shed the stuff that initially seemed cool but which don’t end up working in real life, and to try out new ideas that I didn’t think of ahead of time, working them into the modular scaffolding as I go, but still helps me move in the general direction I originally envisioned (though with enough foundational support that I can quickly and confidently make in-motion adjustments, not worried the whole thing will collapse around my head as I experiment and progress).
Throughout this process, I try to remind myself that I’m at the core of everything I make, and (for better and for worse) that will inform every facet of the things I create and do.
And it’s important that I don’t lose that latent, me-shaped uniqueness, even as I sand away unpleasant rough edges and attempt to make initially confounding components more meaningful for those on the other side of the creator, createe relationship.
If you enjoyed this essay, consider supporting my work by buying me a coffee.
Interesting Links
Is Legal Jargon Actually a ‘Magic Spell’? Science Says Maybe
We also investigated two more possible reasons for using legalese.
The first is the “copy and edit” hypothesis: because legal contracts often address similar circumstances to other contracts, lawyers may copy templates and simply edit the details. Difficult structures such as centre embedding might be unconsciously copied in the template, or added as the lawyer iteratively edits drafts for their client.
The second is the “magic spell” hypothesis. Much like a magic spell, the purpose of legal language is to change the world rather than simply describe it.
Why Scientists Are Working to Save Earth’s Living Skin
Under the dry, piercing heat of the Utah sun, Sasha Reed is growing plots of plants — and bacteria, lichen and fungi, too. But Reed is no farmer, and at first glance, her fields look to be mostly dirt. She’s an ecologist, and what she is growing is cryptobiotic soil.
How to Make Millions as a Professional Whistleblower
The evidence he passes to whistleblower programs he gathers primarily by going undercover—persuading a would-be fraudster to reveal signs of a scheme by posing as a potential investor interested in getting in on the action. That’s why Overum and I have met in this hotel tonight: so I can join him for a meeting with someone he’s investigating.
(If you want more links to interesting things, consider subscribing to Aspiring Generalist.)
Question
Today’s question is about creativity and our capacity to make things.
Consider answering in the comments (via the button below) or hitting “reply” to answer via email. Here’s the question:
If you could have one creative skill—the ability to make or do something that you can’t currently make or do—what would it be?
This is a tough question, as I generally see the collision of different (and even better: seemingly orthogonal) skillsets as the place where the most interesting action happens. Consequently, I’d love to be adept at everything, and then slam a bunch of diverse creative skills together, to see what happens.
But if I had to choose just one, I think I’d like to know enough about biology and chemistry to be capable of coming up with interesting combinations of things, and then use that knowledge to dream-up novel solutions to some of the problems we currently face as a civilization (there’s a lot of fascinating movement in this space related to things like biochar and alternatives to the Haber-Bosch process, for instance).
My second answer (which I’m giving because rules are fake and should be selectively broken) is that I think it would be really cool to know how to envision, choreograph, and perform different sorts of dances. I know so little about this that it’s all new to me, but it seems like it would be a really complex but satisfying undertaking.
Outro
It’s somehow October, and that means we’re entering the span of the year in which many of us realize we’re almost done with this one, despite there still being a fair bit we’d like to get done.
That, in turn, can evoke a sense of panic (distinct from, but possibly also connected to all the other chaotic things happening in our lives and the world right now), which can inform our capacity (or lack thereof) to pursue those final, annual goals.
This is a good moment to focus on breathing, healthy behaviors and habits, and setting ambitious (but realistic for how we’re doing and where we’re at) objectives.
It’s also useful to remember that we can use the new year as a convenient milestone-deadline if there is something we’d like to finish up before we swap out our calendars; a little extra incentive to get our rears in gear and apply noses to grindstones, and to thus knock out that final significant-to-us accomplishment before we start in on 2025.
How’s your October going, thus far? Got anything planned for the next month? The rest of the year? Drop me a message and tell me what’s been going on, and/or take a moment to introduce yourself—I respond to every message I receive and would love to hear from you :)
Spoken word poetry or slam poetry. I went to tons of slams in college and I have so much admiration for their abilities as both wordsmiths and performers. George Watsky is my favorite if you want a point of reference.
New skills...
My first thought was that I'd love to write and publish a novel. I've had some experience writing short fiction and I'm part of a writer's group, but with 12 months left to go on my thesis, there'll be no time for anything except non-fiction writing for a while.
My second thought, since you brought up the dance example, reminded me that dance performance has been a life-long dream of mine, but I definitely lack the skills of timing and spatial awareness and I judge myself far too harshly to give it much of a go. I took up pole dancing a few years ago as a brain break from study (since I can't very well agonise over an essay when I'm upside-down). There are 5 showcases for family and friends each year and so far, I've averaged 2 a year which is pretty exciting for me and I love getting a little taste of the spotlight and doing something about that dream in a small way.