Journal entry
Absence of common sense
One thing that I have noticed through out the years while making music, web sites, or whatever creative work that I have done, is to never trust my own judgement. Why? Because, when in the middle of a creative process, all common sense seem to just disappear from me.
Ever noticed that when sitting in front of the computer screen, doing something you like, time just seem to disappear? It’s like that for me all the time. I can easily kill off 10 hours, and it feels like five minutes. But the thing that really scares me (as if spending 10 hours in a row in front of a screen isn’t scary enough, when you really think about it), is that whenever I’ve finished working on a song or a design, I feel completely empty. I can never clearly remember what choices I made during the process — why I put that drumfill there, why that div had to go there and so on. Oh, I surely learn stuff, and remember what I have learned, but the very reasons for certain details to exist in the finished product just disappear from me. And that is why I can never trust my own judgement while doing what I’m doing. Whenever I’ve finished something, and start to examine what I’ve done, I’m starting to ask myself: why did I put that there? Wow, that was cool, how did I come up with that? Or, much worse, and yet just as common: that really sucks, what the hell was I thinking? It feels as if I don’t have control of what I’m doing, it just flows out of me, and knowing that makes me feel like I haven’t put my entire knowledge into my work, that it has flaws that escaped me, and now it’s too late to repair.
The flipside of this, however, is that I constantly strive to surpass my previous work when jumping into something new, and that’s great. But I just wish I could keep my common sense during the process itself, not just in between processes. That way, I think, I would be more satisfied with my own work.
So, am I alone in this? Do tell if you’ve got similar experiences. It would be great to hear other people’s thoughts on this matter.
- Published May 15th, 2006 at 1:13 am
- 4 comments added
- Categorized in: Music, Webdesign, Personal
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Comments (4)
RSS feed1. Christian Sandberg said this on May 16th, 2006, 5:07 pm
Yea, I know exactly what you mean. I usually just start a song with a beat or a sample and then it starts living it’s own life. The same goes with designing websites. But I think it’s good if you start following your heart and not your brain all the time. After all, that’s what music and designing is all about, isn’t it? There’s nothing right or wrong here.
By the way, I really like your new design. Congratulations.
2. Olof Lönnroth said this on May 17th, 2006, 10:05 am
Bah! You found it! :) It isn’t even finished yet…hmm… I’d better hide this a little better… anyway, thanks.
3. Christian Sandberg said this on May 17th, 2006, 7:33 pm
Now I know why I came here. I have commented here once before, then you clicked the link to my webpage and the referrer showed up in my stats. I didn’t know it was secret, hihi… :)
4. Tay said this on September 26th, 2006, 4:18 pm
I learned from a very early age that whenever you create something (in this case music), once finished, you should put it on the shelf and ignore it for at least a week or two. The purpose of this has a psychological effect in that you are leaving yourself and then reacquainting yourself for the purpose of improvement. It’s somewhat like video recording yourself at a social gathering and then playing it back at a later date; you knew the camera was on and you were being recorded but when looking at it again later in time you spot things that you either didn’t care for or you want to improve.
I only say this to you because the idea of “common sense” as you put it is really a misnomer when it comes to the creative type. There simply is no common sense when truly creating. If there was it could be created by anyone and everyone! There’s nothing common about it.