Pitfalls of creativity clutter

I’ve asked Glen Stansberry of LifeDev to once again grace us with an inspiring post. I hope that you enjoy his writing as much as I do!

It’s a common stereotype that creative people are messy-riddled souls who care more about puppies and wildflowers than any form of organization. I mean, let’s be honest, creative types aren’t exactly the poster children for jotting down lists and effective time management. It’s just not our thing, man.

It’s All About the Environment

That said, our creativity could be greatly enhanced if we didn’t clutter our surroundings. I’ve found in my life that cluttered surroundings directly affect my productivity, so it only makes sense that clutter is going to block the flow of creative juices. However, sometimes being creative actually produces more clutter, limiting the creative output. It’s a vicious cycle.

It’s amazing how much clutter can be produced while brainstorming. A great example would be the materials needed to create a blog post. Because structure and limitations can be a deterrent to creativity, I like to brainstorm in a simple text document. I’ll jot down ideas, sentence fragments and bits of paragraphs. Then I’ll research my posts by browsing articles and other resources on the Internet, saving them to my desktop. Of course there’s also other related material, such as photos and PDFs. Pretty quickly the desktop is cluttered and distracting, and I haven’t even begun to really write the post yet. And, believe me, you’ll feel the effects of the clutter while you’re working.

That small nagging in the back of your mind as you’re trying to focus and create? That’s your brain subconsciously fidgeting because of the surrounding clutter. It knows the clutter is close enough to touch, even if you’re actively trying to mentally push it aside. This struggle is what hinders our creativity most.

Structured Creativity

In order to think clearly and creatively, corralling the clutter is essential. I’ve found that by simply dumping all of the materials into a folder on my desktop is a huge help. And, it’s such a simple solution that could be used for offline purposes as well. Create a physical box for your project materials, and push them to the side. Simple, yet effective.

Another great method for clearing your head is to remove anything from the surrounding area that won’t be used in the project. If you’re on a computer, this means closing applications that aren’t going to be used. This removes all “temptations” of wandering.

While these concepts may not be rocket science, it’s amazing how effective they can be at clearing the road for creative thinking to happen, without any roadblocks.

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Posted by Glen on Jul 2, 2008 | Comments |

7 comments posted

  1. Posted by Joseph Z. - 07/02/2008

    I have the same problem. When I’m brainstorming a blog or a product write-up, I wind up with a bunch of documents with fragments of text. I want to keep the info separate, but I don’t want to end up with a million documents that I can’t wade through (and be annoyed at myself for causing so much clutter).

    I’m wondering what you suggest for this.

  2. Posted by SpaceAgeSage - 07/02/2008

    I find myself working best when my field of vision around the computer and across the room in front of me is uncluttered. Sometimes it really is the simple things that matter.

  3. Posted by Erin Doland - 07/02/2008

    @Joseph Z. — Have you tried Evernote? It has been a huge help for me. I still create the dozens of documents, but Evernote allows me to connect those documents and easily search them. I’m a big fan.

  4. Posted by Joseph Z. - 07/02/2008

    @Erin - Evernote looks pretty good. I haven’t had much luck with “clipping” programs in the past (like Google Notebook) but Evernote seems to be a clipping program on steroids. I like that I can drop in text files without opening them.

    Thanks for the recommendation.

  5. Posted by Alex Fayle - 07/02/2008

    I like to create organized chaos. When the big things in life are organized and in most cases the details are kept in order, then the little things can get chaotic during a really productive creative moment (plus the chaos can create connections you might not have thought of in a totally ordered environment).

    Cheers,
    Alex

  6. Posted by jp - 07/02/2008

    Sorry - That’s really just RE-cluttering - not uncluttering. It will all come back to haunt you in accumulating walls of clutter and the effects are felt regardless. Did you ever study feng shui?

    The best solution is to remove the unnecessary completely out of your environment - it the trash can or recycler or thrift store or freecycle: not your attic or your basement or this Box you are building –or publish it and get it off your desk.

  7. Posted by William - 07/03/2008

    I am of a different persuasion as far as the uses of clutter in a creative setting. In designing, creativity to me is about serendipitous discovery, about making almost-random associations with seemingly unrelated things that lead to some ‘eureka’ moment, when a problem is suddenly more well-defined or the set of possible design solutions becomes clearer. It doesn’t happen at a particular time and doesn’t happen on cue.

    By eliminating from a creative environment and experience what one deems a priori to be unnecessary, the discovery space (i.e. the set of things that could potentially provide inspiration) becomes too limited for the wrong reasons.

    That means to me that there are productive types of clutter and unproductive, and the unproductive ones are situations where physical things (pieces of paper, notebooks, etc) cover up the things I’m working on or cover up sources of inspiration. Good “clutter” provides the greatest potential for innovation, random association, and ultimately inspiration. Perhaps the productive types of “clutter” actually aren’t “clutter,” but that’s semantics.

    I suppose the distinction is between creative sterility and performance-streamlined organization. I would argue “performance-streamlined” for designers and creatives is different from accountants, lawyers, and other professionals.

    (I do have unclutter moments to clear my thoughts and reset my workspace, but that’s a strategic creative move as well…)

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