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Comment by krrishd

18 hours ago

Reminds me of this tweet thread from Emmett Shear (cofounder of Twitch):

"I used to struggle w needing to be “creative” or “original” in my work. At some point I had a breakthrough that really helped me: I cannot repeat an idea, no matter how basic or common, without imparting some of my worldview into it.

Even by choosing which basic ideas to amplify, I impart some small amount of myself into each output. It’s literally impossible for a given tweet to be “unoriginal”. Equally impossible to be Truly Original too of course, since you’re always remixing others thoughts.

This POV does put a premium on cultivating and developing one’s worldview, since that is the underlying originality simmering under the surface of each “basic” thought. The best writing is rewriting, including of other people’s words, and the lens is your whole mind."

from: https://x.com/eshear/status/1539393474612498434

That makes a lot of sense! I recently interviewed several great creators on this exact topic and they all echoed similar ideas - although it's easy to fear that someone else has done it better, oftentimes they really haven't, and they'll never have your own unique perspective.

One challenge is that it takes repetitions to get good enough that you can even bring your ideas to life, and many people don't push through this (Ira Glass "taste gap").

Full interviews here: https://digitalseams.com/blog/making-things-interview-series