One of the author's hint made me pause and reflect as again I was made aware of my attitude towards creativity and productivity, and that attitude was challenged:
"Do a lot. This may seem like strange advice, but I mean it — do a lot. Write a lot, paint a lot, shoot a lot of film, take a lot of pictures, dance a lot, sing a lot, whatever the thing you do is, do it a lot. You have to get limber and skilled, so that when you have an idea, you can manipulate it and do the work part of the work. The idea is sort of the balloon in a balloon animal; you have to have it, and it has to be strong, or else there's nothing. But you'll be distinguished more by your handling of it than by the thing itself, and the best way to do that is to do the thing you do a lot."Growing up with parents that had expectations of excellence in everything their children did, but also a potent, unspoken hierarchy for the which areas of interest took precedence, I always struggled with deciding what exactly to pursue. As a person naturally interested in a lot of things, I was (and still am) frequently immobilized when faced with the choice of what interest or passion to explore.
The pressure to invest either all or nothing into a select few (productive) interests or activities may have indeed shut down a lot of my creative impulses. If I wasn't able to or sure I wanted to commit 110% to something, well then, I'd better not bother with it at all (because I clearly wasn't interested enough) and rather focus more on something useful like learning algebra or operating a power drill. (Not that those thing are not important or useful.) Combined with my natural shyness, I think this pressure drove me to just categorically refuse to engage with things (like dance, art, photography, economics) that peaked my interest but were never given a chance to fully flesh out or dwindle away.
