creativity
Daily Lunch Notes Update
This may be the last two weeks of my punny, daily lunch [https://www.cjchilvers.com/my-most-important-daily-writing-assignment/] notes [https://www.cjchilvers.com/daily-lunch-notes/] to my son. He says the other kids at lunch enjoy them more than he does now. After a few years, the joke is starting get old.
My Holy Grail Pen and Paper
Writers spend way too much time and money seeking out their “grail” pen and paper combo — the tools that will make their work so much “smoother.” It’s a pattern we’ve seen repeated in all creative pursuits. I did that for a while, many years ago, but it faded
For the Best Ideas, Go Without
I just returned from a walk on the beach, jumping in the water, searching for shells with my son. I had nothing on me that couldn’t be underwater in the ocean — pretty much just the clothes on my back. That’s when all the ideas hit me. * The best
25 Years of Creativity for $200
This is the current state of my guitar collection (the 2 of 5-ish guitars that have survived the wear and tear of the past 30+ years). The one on the left was my daily workhorse until 2020. I bought it in the 90s when my then-workhorse guitar (a blue mutant
“Real” cameras lost.
When A Lesser Photographer [https://www.cjchilvers.com/a-lesser-photographer] was released, I caught all kinds of heat from photographers who said, “Get a real camera.” I had the controversial opinion (at the time) that you could express yourself photographically with your phone and the many other “lesser” devices available. It’
The Era of Perfection
YouTuber/Record Producer Rick Beato mourns the loss of imperfect music [https://youtu.be/L-8EbHkc8tc]: It does seem that there’s a new generation of anxiety-filled, perfection-seekers topping the charts. But what’s topped the charts has rarely been what’s interesting to the devoted fans/evangelists of any art
Apply Constraints
We know creativity thrives with constraints [https://hbr.org/2013/01/how-intelligent-constraints-dr]. But what does it have to do with anxiety [https://www.cjchilvers.com/30-practical-tactics-to-decrease-your-anxiety-intro/]? Have too much information and too many options when making decisions is great trigger for your anxiety. This is why minimalism is so popular
Keep Going
Austin Kleon and I tend to write about very similar subjects, but to completely different audiences. I follow his blog [https://austinkleon.com] and read his books [https://austinkleon.com/books/]. More than once I’ve deleted drafts of posts, because he just posted the same thing. So, I look
The Creativity Bubble
It’s never been easier to find better system for solving our problems. What we should be doing is finding better problems to solve. Anything requiring intense thought and risk is naturally avoided for easy answers, safe bets, and “clever” strategies. “Clever” doesn’t change things. It’s a pat