Eminem and the Necessity of Notes

 It can be interesting to see how creative people do their thing.

Today Austin Kleon's e-newsletter introduced me to rapper Eminem's obsessive, crazy-hoarder-looking notetaking... and I felt a rush of sympathy and understanding, for I too scribble notes.  (Less impactful ones, noted.)  

From Kleon to Jillian Hess's piece in Noted HERE, to a film clip with Eminem and Anderson Cooper (in this 60 Minutes clip at 1:11 HERE)...  This is a poet who is obsessed with rhyming and works out his lyrics painstakingly by ear and by hand on scattered bits of paper that he stores in boxes.

We should all be doing this!

Not the scribbled rhymes for us maybe, but the dedicated working out, ruminating, scribbling, and saving.  This is where much of the good stuff that bubbles up in us can be found again later when we need it.

Eminem calls his thought-storage "stacking ammo."

  

To Do

1)   Take a walk
2)   Lay in bed late - just idly thinking
3)   Wash dishes
4)   Go somewhere quiet
5)   Leave town
6)   Play music
7)   Sketch
8)   Daydream
9)   Garden
10) Visit a museum
11) Read something new
12) Eat something different
13) Talk to interesting people
14) Ask questions
15) Play
16) Hang out with a kid
17) Stare at nature
18) Close your eyes and listen
19) Rearrange your desk
20) Make something
21) Use your hands
22) Take a shower
23) Get moving
24) Critique something - how would you improve it?
25) Volunteer
26) Be lazy, lazy, lazy
27) Get bored - then find pencil and paper
28) Do something! Get busy
29) Take photos
30) Write a description
31) Invent a conversation
32) Plan a garden or a vacation or a dream restaurant
33) Ask "What if?"

What prompted this list?  A post at The World's Best Ever of "33 Ways to Stay Creative" HERE.
Earlier posts on creativity: Recharging and Creativity n' Cool.

Dreaming Up Ideas

This is going to sound incredibly dorky, but my latest design came to me in a dream.

It's not unusual for an artist, designer, or other problem-solver to go to bed thinking about an issue - then wake with the answer.  The subconscious mind keeps working, scrabbling away underground.

Sometimes, frankly, it seems as if the ol' subconscious keeps all the good stuff buried - hidden from you - until an idea feels like a little fresh air and strolls upwards to the light of day.  Often that's when you're busy but mentally idling - driving, washing dishes, showering, walking, or in those moments between sleeping and waking.  Then, if you're not too busy to notice and if you move slowly, not to scare it, you can spot a shy new idea in the underbrush.  And catch it!

Public domain image

Anticipation

I'm just dipping my toe into what looks like a fascinating take-it-slow read: Daniel Kahneman's Thinking Fast and Slow.  By a Nobel Prize winner for economics, it's a study of how human minds work, of the ways our intuitive ideas and our conscious/rational thought systems interact as we make decisions.

Art and design, of course, are all about decision-making.

For me, one disadvantage of staying busy-busy with theater design is that I don't get to drop by the library.  But I passed the door today and, on impulse, stopped.  Browsed.  Found this unexpected gift-book of new ideas.

Art and design are also, of course, all about impulse and new ideas.

Science Is Wrong...

The human race is theorized to have evolved from monkeys, but even a cursory examination of the workings of the human brain reveals the flaw in this "monkey" genesis:

It was obviously squirrels.

I mean, look at the way a human mind works!  Either racing in a lunatic way from point A to point B - by way of Z, G, with a double-back at P 1/2 - or our brain curls up in a metaphorical hollow tree to hibernate until we poke it with a stick.  If our brain does find an idea (seen the pop-eyed, startled look on a squirrel's face with a nut crammed it in its mouth?)...  then it darts here and there, not at all sure what to do with the awkward thing.  Mostly we fruitlessly dig for ideas, chittering a squirrelly, "Here?  There? Where?  Must be one somewhere!