Dealing With the Embarrassment of The Creative Process

I've written a couple of times about the phenomenon that quantity tends to drive quality when it comes to idea generation (see posts here and here if you're new here... really, they're not that long. We can wait...).

In my Thanksgiving day guest post, Isaac Asimov alludes to the same proportionality: "...Creation is embarrassing. For every new good idea you have, there are a hundred, ten thousand foolish ones, which you naturally do not care to display.”

In light of the embarrassing nature of the creative process, he makes an unconventional proposal; the quote above actually begins as follows:

“My feeling is that as far as creativity is concerned, isolation is required. The creative person is, in any case, continually working at it. His mind is shuffling his information at all times, even when he is not conscious of it. (The famous example of Kekule working out the structure of benzene in his sleep is well-known.) The presence of others can only inhibit this process, since creation is embarrassing..."

Despite all the (fitting) enthusiasm for collaboration, isolation is, I believe, an absolutely essential form of deliberate disconnection. But noodling on this quote made me wonder, "what are other ways to deal with the distribution problem?"

And I couldn't help but be reminded of my friend, Benjamin Franklin. One of the things that struck me while reading his biography was his frequent use of pseudonyms. At least one scholar contends that "Franklin may have used pseudonyms to prevent prejudgment." I was thinking the very same thing earlier today (interestingly, while napping). What a terrific way to distribute the risk of foolishness across many different egos, so to speak. Using pen names effectively enabled him to explore many different sides of an issue, and express a much wider range of opinions, without nearly as much reputational risk.

So that's two ways to deal with the embarrassment inherent in creative work: Asimov's "work in isolation" and Franklin's liberal use of the pseudonym. What are others you've seen?

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