Bad Habits that Crush Your Creativity and Stifle Your Success

Re:Bad Habits that Crush Your Creativity and Stifle Your Suc... by Dove on Wednesday October 13, 2010 @01:02PM (#1787873)

I clicked through and wound up disappointed. There's merit to the suggestions, no doubt, but I was hoping for something more like this:

   1. Consuming stupid entertainment
   2. Staying up too late
   3. Eating crappy food
   4. Not ever getting fresh air
   5. Starving your muse

   . . .

The self-confidence and intellectual exploration stuff I already know. If I didn't, I wouldn't be creative in the first place.

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Re:Bad Habits that Crush Your Creativity and Stifle Your Suc... by joe_the_user on Wednesday October 13, 2010 @03:53PM (#1788610)

Yes,

It has a few decent suggestions but I'm annoyed at generic advice that has little to do with habits in particular. IE, How is "lack of confidence" a habit??

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Re:Bad Habits that Crush Your Creativity and Stifle Your Suc... by lionhearted on Wednesday October 13, 2010 @04:13PM (#1788681)

This one stood out to me:

> 5. Starving your muse

Care to elaborate? Looks like something worth thinking about.

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Re:Bad Habits that Crush Your Creativity and Stifle Your Suc... by Dove on Wednesday October 13, 2010 @04:33PM (#1788767)

I first heard the expression in an article about resolving writer's block [1]. While that particular article is specific to role-playing games, the idea has more general application and I've heard other writers refer to it.

The basic idea is that you can't always be creating. You're never as original as you think you are; your output depends on your input. If you are a storywriter, you need to remember to read for pleasure. Seek new experiences, consume the things that are innovative or interesting or just plain cool in your field of choice. If you keep your muse well-fed on interesting ideas, she'll be ready to provide you with new ideas when you need them.

It applies even in a technical context. Even if you are forced to work in Java or Ada or on a horrific enterprise application, you should be playing in Haskell during your free time, reading papers on interesting algorithms, doing recreational mathematics, that sort of thing. The ideas that will come to you when facing your work are much improved by play.

My own creativity-killing bad habit is to starve my muse. Either to drown myself so completely in the act of creation that I run out of ideas, or to intellectually consume crap rather than good stuff.

[1] http://www.geocities.com/blackhatmatt/tickling_the_muse.htm

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