Creativity is not a formula

The sooner it’s accepted, the more at ease you can feel in your creative skin.

The thing is, creativity is not a formula. Here are three things that rarely get said out loud.

Creativity is subjective.

Subjectivity is personal. One person loves floral prints, the other wouldn’t go near them. Another loves sans serif font, the other prefers a formal serif. As humans, we have preferences built from experience, opinion, and visual connection. Things that make us cringe, and others that make us feel at ease, inspired, or want to be close to.

In plain terms, your creative outputs will never suit everyone. After spending many working hours in design, with this in mind, it is important that you can accept this, learn how to adapt if needed (for the sake of your client, or career), or take it on board if you’re at the subjectivity of creative freedom.

Creativity is relentless

The mental strain from creativity is valid. I’m referring to the extra frustrating hour it takes to make a simple design decision, not being able to focus on your output because your personal life needs attention, or just having an “off” day, week, month or year. It happens to all of us, but it is barely talked about in our industry.

Those back of head thoughts when uncertainty takes over. What if it’s not good enough? What if they don’t like it? What if it breaks, fails, doesn’t stand the test of time? What if it’s not unique, groundbreaking?

The reality, and beauty, of creativity is that there are always multiple ways to do something. Just because you witnessed another way, doesn’t mean your pathway is at fault.

Creativity is not a calendar task.

Deadlines are promised, but how are we supposed to know how “on” we will be in that timeframe, to produce our best output? If we’re so worried about creating to meet a date, the enjoyment or natural flow of creativity is stifled.

Is the deadline a product of a rushed finish because we were pushed to produce something, and does that then have a flow on effect to the rest of the project, or relationship with the client?

I would say, an architectural project is ‘overdue’ far more times than it is completed on time. But we keep the date anyway.

Depending on your work structure and clients, I would suggest considering the term ‘deadline’. Not to drag things on, but to restructure your output in a way that fosters creativity, not force it. Lately I’ve been sampling some theories, which I will share in a following article.

Creativity in its complex nature is what makes no day, or outcome, the same. There is a kind of beauty in that. We will constantly be developing, adapting, researching, praised, criticised, all while staying true to our practice. The sooner this openness is accepted, the more at ease you can feel in your creative skin.