How Limits Fuel Creativity

There's this concept I wanted to talk about that's called creative limitation. I like to think of it as essentially the opposite of choice paralysis. Let's define both concepts first, so we're all on the same page. I'll begin with choice paralysis, as this is more likely to be something you've experienced, and can use as a springboard to make better sense of the thème du jour.

Choice paralysis is that feeling where you have so many options that your brain cannot process all the data required to make a choice. It's that time when someone says something like "Oh, you speak Russian? Say something!" Your brain gets stuck buffering because there's essentially no limit to the things you can say, and even though it might seem like that should make it easier to just say something, the reality is actually quite the opposite. All of a sudden you're perhaps processing questions like "What's the best thing to say in this situation?" and "What's the most interesting-sounding phrase I know?" or "What can I say that will elicit interest in my language instead of stereotypical remarks?" instead of just saying "Вот как звучит русский" (this is what Russian sounds like) and being done with it.

This is partially why I take issue with all these supposedly motivational quotes along the lines of "you are limitless! Fly, you magnificent butterfly! Fly anywhere you want!" The poor butterfly, magnificent though it is, becomes overwhelmed and overstimulated, starts showing signs of burnout before any action even takes place, and then goes back to streaming Netflix all day because that's a less overwhelming choice.

Creative limitation is on the other side of the spectrum. It's when you're staring at a blank piece of paper telling yourself you have to write something now and instead of continuing to buffer due to infinite possibilities, you say "Ok, what if I can only write about green things?" and see where that takes you. It gives you a sort of springboard to start from, allowing you to then polish the outcome however you see fit, but polishing and tweaking is a piece of cake compared to having to pick from an unending list of choices. You can read some interesting examples in Ashleigh Allsopp's article on this topic, where she describes several cases of how artists used their limitations to drive creativity.

Of course there's always a dark-ish side. While self-imposed limitations can be quite fun to play with, we often find ourselves at the mercy of circumstantial limitations. These are much more difficult to love, because there's no control involved, and as often happens, something you enjoy gets taken away.

So, the limitation might be a lack of supplies, a lack of funding, a sudden health concern that disallows you to use your body in the same way you could before, forcing you to have to rethink your entire approach. The best thing we can do in this case is embrace the constraint, and work with it instead of despite it.

That said, this doesn't mean you have to be happy about it. This means you say "I hate this and it makes me so upset, but life has to go on so this is how it shall do that." And then sometimes the results will leave you satisfied, while other times you'll write it off to experience, accepting that everything about that situation sucked. I've said it before and I'll say it again, it is OK to not like every result, and it is also OK to not like many results in a row.

Also, just in case someone needs to hear this, sometimes it's even OK to admit that you hated that experience so much that you need to figure out how to avoid it if possible. It's fine to learn things about yourself in the process and then tweak and polish your plans, much like it is OK to create something that isn't great to start with and tweak and polish until it's at least a bit better than before. This is also a big part of creative thinking, learning, and a general growth-oriented outlook.

Everything about generating anything boils down to quantity before quality to a certain degree, though. You're more likely to succeed in a high-stakes situation with a circumstantial, anger-inducing limitation if you've had a lot of practise working within consciously set limitations where the stakes were low. The more you practise being creative, the easier it will be to apply. Then again, a lack of experience can also be seen as a creativity-fuelling restriction. The ultimate Inception-like twist. Not for the faint of heart, but hey, if it works, it works.

Creativity is, after all, about finding workarounds and solving problems. It's manifested in my embroidering my grandmother's old, rusty sieve to hang it up as art instead of having to throw out an, albeit mundane, piece of my family's past. It's manifested in the way someone dealing with chronic pain learns to navigate their life. It's manifested in Antoine-Augustin Parmentier's effort to popularize potatoes in France by hiring heavily armed guards for his field and instructing them to take bribes and allow people to steal the potatoes he grew there.

So I guess what I'm trying to say here is that using limits as a tool is a skill of its own, which, like every other skill, takes time to get good at. Start small, make up a rule to try and follow, see where it leads you. Experiment and play your way to a more creative brain.