Dec 24
Deadlines and Creativity
Topic: Updates|
The responses I received on the last post has me thinking even more about creativity. I have somewhat put my photography on the side for just a bit so that I can write. I have had several freelance writing projects this past year which of course means deadlines. The project I am writing right now has some pretty tight deadlines and I am finding that I am working quite well under the pressure.
So now my questions go to you: Is the creativity the best it can be under pressure? Could it be better if there wasn’t a deadline? Would it have been done at all if the deadline wasn’t put before you? And finally do you work well under pressure? Explain why you do or do not work well under pressure.
December 28th, 2009 at 9:41 am
The answer to this question is complicated. As with many questions, the easy answer is “It depends.”
The only part of creativity that absolutely *cannot* be rushed is the basic inspiration. For example, say I am a fiction writer. A deadline might very well assist me to get a story completed, but it would *not* help me think up the idea for what the story itself was going to be about in the first place.
So if you are without inspiration, a deadline will result in inferior work. On the other hand, a deadline will often focus me to complete work that I have been putting off. I know what I want to do with a project, but have been distracted by life’s inanities. In that case, a deadline serves to prioritize your creative side and is most beneficial. At least that’s been my experience.
December 30th, 2009 at 5:43 am
You made me think of MacGyver (laugh). If he was a real person, we could say he was inspired by pressure itself! And many things in life seem to be that way. “Necessity as the mother of inventions” is a popular saying around here.
Could you call the deadline a necessity? I did back in college, but then the writting material was never 100% mine, it was scientific. I believe your case is 100% original work, and it is difficult to imagine having a deadline for that. Personally, I would probably never feel I had finished! That happened in classical drawing classes, I was not very good and yet I’d feel wierd when the work was “done”, could always add this or that. Now if I try to picture myself back then having a deadline? I believe I’d create less, or try less difficult things, in fear I’d not be able to finish it the way I imagined. But that is also because I’d feel terrible publishing or selling something I found bad. Some people might not care and just do art for the selling part of it.
And then motivation comes again: What is making you create? Is the deadline itself because you need the money from its selling to pay bills? Is it because you love exposing your ideas to the world? Is it to achieve a social status? Or you could even ask yourself: what motivates me to have a deadline on what I create? Maybe the deadline is part of the whole process, or just there to bother you.
Personally, the deadlines helped me in college, I had too much writting to do, and the deadlines would help me organize what should be finished first. But as for drawing classes, deadlines were never there and I am happy for it. Sorry I can’t picture much what would happen then.
January 2nd, 2010 at 12:23 pm
Arioch - For me it depends on what I am working on as to if a deadline works or not. Also, it depends on what the project is and what stage it is in.
Photography projects come easy for me. With or without a deadline I can produce. Writing projects take a little more and I think I definitely work better with a deadline. It makes me sit down and write.
January 2nd, 2010 at 12:26 pm
Carolina - You bring up a great point about motivation. There are a variety of things that can motivate people.
Most of my life has been driven by deadlines, school, teaching, freelance work, etc… I am pretty sure the only thing that hasn’t been under deadline (and not all of it) has been my photography.