I was here first… Creative Anger Management

Posted: November 6, 2008 at 10.21 pm
Posted by Graham Smith in Opinions

GUEST POST BY Anca Foster

Website : http://visualdexterity.com
Twitter : http://twitter.com/anca_foster

The Pyramids! You all know about them, every person in the world heard about their existence, right? You also know that the Egyptian and Mayan pyramids were build using the same astronomical principles, have the same shape, just different sizes and architectural features. Now imagine, if Egyptians and Mayans would’ve had internet, after they were done building them they would’ve found out about each-other, you think they would’ve tried to  bring the others down, and make them unpopular by saying bad things about them or make accusations of stealing the ideas? Hmm…

The internet makes for a great resource when creating, no matter that it’s graphic design, web-design, arts, music, or anything you can think of. Inspiration is why we all do research at the beginning of a creative process. Due to the fact that we are all part of the same species and that our synapses function pretty much in the same way, 2 people from 2 different parts of the world are likely to have the same idea, even at roughly the same time.

The duplication of genes applies also to our physical features: I’m sure it happened to each one of you, at least once, for someone to tell you that you look like someone they know, or like a celebrity. Do you take that as an offense? No, you don’t even think about it too much, because there’s not much you can do about it, except maybe have your mother sue the mother of said celebrity for “copyright infringement“, which would be ridiculous, right?

A lot of times it happens in the design world for us to see concepts similar to ours, and get angry about it. It happened to me a few times in the recent past, and I have designer friends who had the same thing happen to them on multiple occasions. At first you don’t know what to do, and there are different approaches to this problem (and here goes a list, for all you lists lovers ;) )

1. Get angry, talk to friends about it, get rational about it and realize it wasn’t a personal attack, and that sometimes other people have good ideas as well, besides yourself. You move on and get motivated to have better ideas, and to make your next creation a masterpiece. I call this the “Meh, Whatever, I’m Totally Over It” Approach.
2. Get angry, talk to friends about it, stay irrational about it, fire the friends who try and get some sense into you, get more bitter and bitter each day. Eventually you will grow so bitter that you will be afraid to show the world your ideas, and most likely change the field you work in. Let’s call this the “Create Out of Spite” Approach.
3. Get angry, talk to friends about it, complain to friends about it, complain to the rest of the world about it, make it public, start throwing accusations to the other person who coincidentally enough had the same idea as you did, hoping that the world will start throwing rocks and bury your competition, and you will be acknowledged as the king of creation, master of design, whose ideas everybody is going after to steal. It might be too much of an obvious name for it, but i call it the “Lamest” Approach.
4. Get angry, talk to friends about it, start stealing the competition’s ideas, while complaining about them that they are stealing yours. Make a global internet design drama out of it, start creating sides, turn people against each other, and proclaim yourself to be the superior designer of contemporary times, whose ideas everybody is out there to steal, even though you know the truth - it began with a coincidence, and you took it too far. I hate this approach the most, it’s called the “Hypocritical Bastard” Approach.

As you see, there is no way around getting angry about it, it’s a natural reaction. What matters, though, is what we do next. Each of us has a different way of dealing with tough situations, depending on the maturity level and the emotional stress we are going through at the time, hence choosing different approaches. The ones above are just the main ones, and I am sure there are millions of ways to handle an issue like creativity “theft”. But what got me into writing about this is that I am surprised to see good designers taking the #4 approach.

In my opinion, #1, the “Meh, Whatever, I’m Totally Over It”  approach, has the biggest benefits to you, as a creative person, and to the world around you. There are no negative consequences, and in the long run you will become better and better at what you do, develop your creativity process, and eventually your ideas will become unique.

#4 however, is the worst. The “Hypocritical Bastard” approach might benefit you for the moment, you might enjoy destroying the other people who dared come up with a similar idea without knowing you had also thought of it. But, be aware that you can only do that for so long, and after a while people tend to get sick of hearing you complain. You will end up being despised, and even if you will grow to become a respected creative, you will be looked at as the designer with great talent but that no-one can stand. Probably it will take a while to get to that stage, and you will enjoy your small victories on the road, but I am positive that at some point you will end up regretting not taking approach #1.

So yeah, what does all this have to do with the pyramids? My point is that the same concept can be treated in different ways, and you get 2 incredibly good results, each having its strengths and weaknesses, each having its fans and haters. If the Mayans and Egyptians would’ve spent their time fighting with each-other instead of building their pyramids, there probably wouldn’t be any masterpieces, and they would’ve end up in a war, reciprocally destroying their creations.

I love being part of the design community! It’s so much fun to get to critique and create things together, and I am always very excited to see someone succeeding! Sometimes I do get jealous, though, and get angry when I see my concepts somewhere else, but it only takes a little time, a positive attitude and encouragement from other people for me to snap out of it.

I hope that after reading this, all of you will chose approach #1 next time you see two similar ideas, and when it happens to someone you know, encourage them to be positive about it, and don’t start a creativity war - there will be no winners coming out of it.

All I am trying to say here is that ideas are not unique! That’s the reason for which patents were invented, because more than one person will have the same idea, and the point is to adapt it to ourselves, not steal it! And if it’s a great idea, it is even more likely that someone else will have it - regardless if it’s a space shuttle, a great song style (hence genres), a logo mark or an identity name, and would be naive of us, especially in todays time, to think that we own every right to basically - a thought. Therefore, we have to learn to accept this and make the best out of it, in a positive manner.

Or, we can just start singing “I feel pretty, oh so pretty!” and go from there.