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How to be Creative

howtobecreative.co

15 pointsacoyfellow19 comments

The copy at the top of the page threw me for a loop. I read it as "You don't have to be artistic to be creative", but then it's followed by "Whoever told you that, lied to you". This negates the first statement making me think that I do need to be artistic to be creative. Maybe I need some sleep. Let me know what you meant by the copy.

My intention is to make people realize they do not need artistic skills in order to use creativity.

I believe creativity is just a form of problem solving, and some people happen to know how to tap into it better than others. This is an attempt at shedding some light into my mind and how I view the subject.

I want to make the copy less confusing. Did my answer help clarify how you feel? Do you have any suggestions how I can word this better as a headline?

I'd wager "Whoever told you that, lied to you" was meant to say "Whoever told you 'you have to be artistic to be creative' lied to you."

"Whoever told you that you need talent to be creative, lied to you."-- any better?

How about:

"Whoever told you creativity is something you're born with, lied to you."

Even better.

"Creativity is not art, skill, or luck. Creativity is a problem solving skill"

Either it's a skill, or it isn't.

I over thought the sh*t out of that. Thank you for pointing out this obvious confusion.

I'm trying to simplify a extremely complex idea, and because writing is not my strong point, I'm bound to mess up. Thanks again.

I'm excited for the next ebook "How to be handsome"

You callin' me pretty, boy?

At quick glance, spotted a few typos. Suggest running it through a spell checker. Paragraphs jumps from left justification to full justification - use just 1 (left is my suggestion). And you can afford to turn off hyphenation with so much sentence space.

Stick to letter/A4 document size - easier to read/scroll through and print for those that want a physical copy.

Those blue lines (in all caps), they seem so random. Sometimes they are of their own paragraph. Sometimes they appear at the start, sometimes at the end and sometimes they're in quotation marks. Avoid using all caps if the sentence is long, it really reduces readability.

Either you're pressing enter twice to break the paragraphs or the spacing is too much. Try decreasing it.

Good typography really help. So thought I'd throw those suggestions at ya.

Thank you so much for pointing these out. All things I am going to use to modify the .PDF-- I want it to be as optimal as it can.

Forgive my pedantry, but things are either optimal or they are not. There are not degrees of optimality, though things can be nearer or farther from optimal. Like uniqueness.

I know some people hate this kind of comment, but since you are writing and we like to offer constructive advice around here, please take this as a friendly bug report.

I forgive your pedantry, and I consider what said to be very constructive, thank you.

I respect your opinion; but I really disagree, I believe "optimal" is a word that is only defined by relativity.

One person can be more optimal at doing a job than another, one tool can optimize your website better than another. You can be really far from optimal, or really close.. Or somewhere in between?

"There are not degrees of optimality, though things can be nearer or farther from optimal. "-- Well they can be degrees of near or far.. To me that is "degrees of optimality".

I'd love to continue talking with you about this outside of HN, if you want to. Coeyman at gmail.com

The OED definition is "Best, most favourable, esp. under a particular set of circumstances".

So it really is not the degree of goodness or bestness, but the absolute best. Again, like uniqueness, a boolean property.

This is only important to me because I'm a scientist/engineer. If I claim my system performs optimally, this is a big claim and needs proof, since I'm claiming it could not possibly be better. Since I have to be so careful in technical writing, my spider-sense tingles when I see technical terms used with an almost-but-not-exactly correct meaning. YMMV.

Interesting. Reminds me of Hugh MacLeod's book Ignore Creativity: http://www.amazon.com/Ignore-Everybody-Other-Keys-Creativity...

I took a different approach to creativity than Hugh did in his eBook "How to be Creative". One of things he says is that creative type people have 2 "jobs", one to pay bills and one to be creative. I think he is dead wrong.

Creativity is a problem solving technique. It's not art.

Me mentions religion, and some scientific ideas, where I try to take a new angle on the subject.

I'd definitely like to work somewhere where 'Imagination Specialist' is a real job title :)

I hope to eventually work for myself, and be able to take whatever title I see fit.

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