536 divergence vs. convergence

A couple days ago, I had a realization about my working habits. 

For years now, a good part of my "work" output has consisted of coming up with random ideas. First, I would jot them down in journals, then on scratch paper I would look at at the end of the year, and now, on a tablet where they, um, well, I don't know what I'm doing with them.

To be fair, every once in a while I'll take one of the ideas and spin it out into long form. This can take, like, a shit ton of work. A year for a novel, five years for a movie, ten years for a musical. 

Every once in a while, I could also dive into all the random ideas for material. My book, "A Stable of Unicorns: Twenty five billion dollar start up ideas" was such an endeavor, as were my annual collections of poetry.

But mostly, I just keep coming up with ideas. 

Why?

Am I an idea guy? Maybe.

But often as not, I just hum that old Beatles tune, Nowhere Man, dreaming up his "nowhere plans for nobody."

About fifteen years ago, the universe pointed me toward an answer. Videoing a lecture about the creative process, the CEO of the moment talked about two phases of creativity: divergence and convergence.

Divergence is when you are looking for an answer so you throw out a shit ton of possibilities. Convergence is when you have a shit ton of possibilities, so you look at them all and sort out one course of action. 

Divergence is when I write down every random idea that pops into my head. Convergence is when I pick one (or some) and write a book about it.

So what was my realization?

My early start in advertising gave me a predilection for divergence. Basically, as a young creative in that world, your job is to come up with ideas. Lots and lots of ideas. This is divergence. Then you run them by your boss, the creative director, and they pick out one or two for you to develop more. Eventually, one of these ideas might go in front of the client. Even less likely, it will be produced, and appear in media. That is convergence.

Why is the system set up this way?

Well, by the time you become a creative director, you're really a manager. You don't necessarily have time to come up with ideas, plus, your job is now picking the best ideas that your team has come up with. Your job is convergence.

But the young creative? Your job is divergence.

Somehow in that process, I really took on divergence. Coming up with ideas was where it's at.

Except, you know, to get anything done, you kind of have to move past that. Pick an idea and run with it. 

So far, I haven't really managed that. Oh sure, I've done a couple movies and some books, but you should see some of the ideas I've had.

Along the way, I maybe convinced myself that actually what I was good at was coming up with ideas. Maybe follow through just wasn't my thing.

But now I'm thinking maybe that's just what I was trained to do.

Well, I could share some screencraps now, but I think I'll just follow my 2021 mantra, Less is More.