I’m a DJ.
So are you.
You see, our brains are just gigantic remixers.
They take in sounds, sights, smells, and ideas and smash them together to create the strangest combinations.
While most of these combos are cringeworthy (pickle and peanut butter sandwiches, anyone?), some of them turn out to be breathtaking.
Just look at the wild world of the Web.
Facebook combined yearbooks with the internet.
Instagram combined the Facebook Feed with the smartphone camera.
Amazon combined the bookstore with the internet.
And so on…
You see even more remixing in the art world.
The Beatles took the harmonic style of the Everly Brothers and the Beach Boys, the rock-n-roll riffs of Chuck Berry and co., and turned it all into their own freaky, British mishmash.
Pablo Picasso took the modern style of Cezanne (and others) and combined it with forms found in African art.
Andy Warhol took screenprinting techniques, combined it with iconic photography, and created a whole new brand of “art”.
All these people were creative because they were at the intersection of so many different movements, people, etc. They had a diversity of concepts constantly colliding into them.
It’s no wonder that their magnificent brains cobbled together a handful of these ideas into interesting creations.
And there’s no reason that you can’t be creative–you just have to increase your cortical collisions. In other words: you have to expose yourself to as many new ideas and people as possible.
You have to travel to new places. You have to read a variety of new books from a range of topics. You have to visit blogs you never thought you’d be interested in. You have to talk to people from opposing political parties. You have to hang out in strange bars you wouldn’t be caught dead in.
In short: you have to mix things up. Pump as much novelty into that noggin of yours as possible… then let your bodacious brain do the rest of the work.
I think you’ll like what you see.
Until tomorrow,
Jason
PS: I’ve created a Facebook group for people who want to get more regular (and unhinged) updates from me.
There’s an approval process. Existing customers of my Premium Newsletter and my other products will get priority.
