Tag: inspiration

Creative Grit!

This, by Annie Murphy Paul is a very interesting blogpost I came across today. This one is on “creative grit”.

There are two very interesting things that the blogpost talks about.

The first is that there are two ways to creativity – the “traditional way” (the way I’ve always seen it) is to think about the problem, internalise it and then somewhere “wait for inspiration to strike”.

The other method that the author talks about, referring to artist Franz Kline, is to “just keep trying”. Kline would make hundreds of paintings every night. And he would find that one (or few) of them would be good enough to work further on. So this form of creativity comes from repeated practice.

Then later in the blogpost, she also talks about some research on when creativity hits. Again, “traditionally” we are trained to think that if creativity has to “hit” us for a particular problem, that is much more likely to occur early on in our effort. Based on this, a lot of us creative people have come up with heuristics where if solution doesn’t occur within a few iterations of trying, we just give up and move on.

Annie Murphy Paul says that this is the incorrect approach. Quoting from her post:

Lucas and Nordgren call this the “creative cliff illusion”: we imagine that, after an initial upward leap, our creativity will then fall off a cliff—when in reality our creativity capacities are just getting ready to ascend.

We also misjudge the thoroughness of our search. In one study, people estimated that they had explored 75 percent of the solution space—when in fact they had covered only 20 to 30 percent of the relevant domain.

I sure should try the second method that she recommends – keep trying and occasionally you’ll be happy with the result. Or maybe I already do that with all my writing (this blog, my newsletters, etc.) – basically “spray and pray”. The reason I’ve managed to write so much is that I have a low bar for myself. So I write a lot of rubbish. And occasionally I end up writing something people like. On the other hand when I’m paid to write, I don’t “spray and pray”. And in trying to limit my downside I limit my upside as well.

And thinking about it, the reason this method works is that in creative pursuits only the wins matter. As long as you produce sufficient wins, no one cares about your duds!

While on the topic of creativity, here is an ancient lecture (maybe my first ever recorded “speech”) I gave on why “quality takes time”. This clearly shows that at least as of mid-2004 (coincidentally just before I started this blog) I used to strongly believe in the “wait for inspiration to strike” model of creativity.

Oh and btw, read the whole post. It’s worth it.

Rajkumar Hirani Copycat

Ok this post has nothing to do wtih Five Point Someone or its related controversies. Yeah, the story is inspired by 5PS more than the claimed 3% but I’ll let Chetan Bhagat and his army of followers fight out that battle. Copying from others is honourable, at least you are taking inspiration from someone. What is just not done is copying from oneself. It simply shows lack of creativity and laziness to come up with new ideas.

Maybe when Rajkumar Hirani made 3 Idiots, he assumed that the public would have forgotten Munnabhai MBBS. He assumed that Munnabhai MBBS would be so out of circulation that it would have gone out of people’s minds, eclipsed by the more successful sequel Lage Raho. What he didn’t bargain for was that Munnabhai MBBS was on the menu on the New York JFK  to Dubai Emirates Airlines flight, and that people like me would watch it within 3 weeks of watching 3 idiots.

The similarities are uncanny. Both colleges are “Imperial”, have Boman Irani playing the “big prof” (diro here, dean there), and acting similarly in both. Both have a nerdy Tam who comes 2nd in class, 2nd to the hero. Yeah, Chatur is caricatured in 3I while Swami is given a more positive role in Munnabhai. Both are about the system, about how the larger-than-life hero fights the system and makes the big prof realize that the way he has been running the institution is wrong. The hero’s love interest is the big prof’s daughter. And so on..  Just that Munnabhai and Rancho use different methods to achieve their goals, that’s all.

I suppose most of you would have watched 3Idiots recently. I urge you to pick up a DVD or a torrent of Munnabhai MBBS and watch it, again. And keep an eye out for the similarities. You will be convinced that Rajkumar Hirani is guilty of copying, from his own stuff. It is indeed sad to see a good director such has him stooping to Anu Malik* depths.

While on the topic of 3Idiots, my esteemed colleague Baada wanted me to do a stud-fighter post on the movie. I suppose all of you who have seen the movie will easily figure out why the framework fits. I don’t think it needs any more explanation from the resident stud-fighter expert, that is me. Also, if you recall, I had taken a vow that I won’t do any more stud-fighter blogging. Though I must mention that my book on the topic is going nowhere.

* Listen to the prelude music of Ae Mere Humsafar from Baazigar, and then to the title song of Ishq. Next, listen to the interlude music of Kitaben Bahut Si, again from Baazigar, and then to the title song from Fiza. The self-copy is obvious. And I must mention that I had used this concept in a quiz question, twice. Yeah, I’ve also been guilty of “petering” my own questions.

Studs and Fighters and Form

It’s been a long time since I wrote about the Studs and Fighters framework. I had overdosed on it a few months back, when I’d put some 3 posts in 4 days or something, but that was when I was hajaar enthu about corporate affairs.

It’s been almost two months since I quit my last job, and in this period, among other things I’ve lost all enthu for anything corporate. I don’t find Dilbert funny anymore. I usually just put well left to the office-politics posts that some of my friends on Google Reader share. And since the S&F theory was mainly meant to deal with corporate situations, that too has gone to the backburner.

I was thinking about Mitchell Johnson’s inclusion in the Aussie team in the Third Test. Given how badly he has been bowling all tour, and given that Stuart Clark hasn’t been bowling badly at all, it seems like a surprising selection. But dig deeper, and employ my favourite framework, and you’ll know why he’s still in the team.

It seems like Johnson is a stud bowler (as I’d remarked earlier, Test match bowling in general is stud). And the theory goes that form matters so much less for the stud. This is mainly because studs are significantly more inconsistent than fighters, which makes forecasting one data point based on historical data a nightmare. This also means that the last few data points say much less about a stud’s next data point than they do for a fighter’s case.

All that a stud needs to do to make amends for his hitherto bad form is to come up with one, or maybe a handful of moments of inspiration/insight. And that can happen any time. In fact, theory says that it is more likely to happen when the stud is defocussed on what needs to be done.

So even in the first couple of Tests, you could see Johnson occasionally coming up with the totally awesome delivery, which would produce wickets. Most of the time he was crap, but the occasional moments of brilliance were enough for him to make an impact. So the thinking in persisting with him is that sooner or later, he will produce enough moments of brilliance in a game that no one will look at all the crap he has bowled, and even that the moments of brilliance can push up his confidence which can lead to less crap.

This kind of thinking doesn’t apply to a traditional fighter, who isn’t capable of that “moment of brilliance”. He usually relies on consistency, and accuracy, and process to do what he needs to do. For the fighter, it has to be a steady rise from one “form situation” to another. And so persisting with the fighter doesn’t make sense. So for example, if Mike Hussey continues batting in the same way as he has been this series, there is a case of sending him to domestic cricket.

The problem with a lot of fighters is that they refuse to acknowledge the existence of studs and treat them too as fighters (on the other hand, most studs understand the existence of fighters). And this treatment of studs (assuming they are fighters) can have disastrous effects.