I love magic tricks. A great illusion puts a bit of ambiguity back into my world – a world that is far too black and white. The world likes to be clear cut and simple. But it isn’t. The world is filled with mystery and contradiction. It’s filled with ambiguity.
Wonder and curiosity happen in ambiguity. Wonder and curiosity are foundational to creativity.
The test of a first-rate intelligence is the ability to hold two opposing ideas in mind at the same time and still retain the ability to function. F. Scott Fitzgerald
That sounds almost schizophrenic. Doesn’t it? Two opposing ideas being true at the same time? Ambiguity.
Intelligence (and creativity) are really about the ability to deal with ambiguity. It’s the ability to acknowledge you don’t know everything. And it’s the desire to keep searching. It’s the willingness to accept that two seemingly opposite ideas are true.
The Bible’s filled with these seemingly schizophrenic ideas: one God in three persons, being dead with Christ yet living…
I’ve been consumed lately with this idea that creativity happens between two extremes.
Light, for instance, is a seeming contradiction. It functions like a wave. But it functions like particles. Light functions in two different ways…but in one way. Learn more.
The point. Give yourself some room for ambiguity. I’m not saying to embrace sin or go universalist. But don’t be so quick to judge. Don’t be so quick to discount an idea because it doesn’t fit your model of how the world works. Embrace others and others’ ideas. Embrace a bit of schizophrenia in your art.
It seems like you are playing off of the idea that innovation happens at intersections. Check out the Medici Effect. http://www.themedicigroup.com/downloads/MediciEffect.pdf
Not quite in this post…but I’ve been working on that for another. 😛
It seems like you are playing off of the idea that innovation happens at intersections. Check out the Medici Effect. http://www.themedicigroup.com/downloads/MediciEffect.pdf
Not quite in this post…but I’ve been working on that for another. 😛