On Hunting for Ideas (or the most incohesive, fragmented essay I wrote...) - #30
On Hunting for Ideas (or the most incohesive, fragmented essay I wrote...)
I'll admit, this essay was the first thing to come out of my head and I did not hesitate to start writing it. Like, as I write these words, I only started writing this five seconds ago and did not ponder on this idea before I began typing - so here we go.
**Disclaimer: Hi guys, this is future me checking my work after I finished typing. Let me first put this out there: I am in no way comparing myself to any of the people that I will mention below. That would be stupid and supremely egotistical. Again, not comparing myself in any way. Alright, continue.**
Why this topic? I remember hearing from multiple people, including friends, family, and strangers who run into me that sometimes say, "Hey - how'd you come up with that?" or "Huh, tell me how you thought of that?" And the hard truth is, and this is kind of embarrassing, but a lot of what I did was like when the Dutch met the native Brazilians 500 years ago and saw their plentiful amounts of sugar at the time - I stole it
Okay, bad way to put it, I know. How do I describe this? You know when you're with your friends sipping on strawberry shakes and you're just shooting the sh*t and one of you try to make out a word or two and mash it together to make a new word? And then you go, "Hey, strawberry lumps in my straw! That sounds like a sick band name!" Well, while many forget that nugget of whatever and continue the conversation, I keep that in my head and write it down later when I get a chance. Sounds something like a maniac would do. I'm fully self-aware. And yes, that was an iCarly reference.
When I watch a TV show or a standup special, I kind of do the thing that Quentin Tarantino did when he was a video clerk at some Blockbuster-type shop. He would watch every movie in the store. There was a lot of downtime, so when he had the chance, he'd grab a movie, plug in the TV, and watch it. If there was a part he liked, he would stop it, rewind, replay it. Stop, rewind, replay. "How did that guy do that shot?" Stop, rewind, play. Over and over and over again. I do the same thing. After I'm done with a movie, I would go on Youtube and find the scene I liked a lot. And I'd replay it, over and over again. I probably watched the intro to the film "Anchorman"... maybe 30 times over two days? Slightly exaggerated estimate - honestly because I lost count. Now, I know all the intricacies of that Brian de Palma "multiple frames next to a frame" trope utilized in a comedy movie. Link!
When I see a clever piece of writing on a script or a joke, I would sometimes break it down by asking myself, "Wait a minute, how does this work? Tone? Characters? Number of words? Timing?" All that good stuff. My comedy idol is George Carlin, and when I find a joke or a piece of writing he did, I just replay it in my head till I know the formula of how he made that joke. My head is technically full of these little formulas and tropes for jokes and silly stuff.
On the last STS thread, a nice friend replied and said, "Don, it seems like you are always doing something. Have you tried being bored?" And I said, "Huh, good point. I'll try that." Lo and behold, boredom helps in finding ideas. I've now committed to throwing my phone into the other room. I close unnecessary tabs. I tell myself not to check Instagram till the end of the day. I stopped being on Tinder so much. I started going on walks by myself without headphones. I turn off the music in my car. And much like George Carlin and Larry David did, I carry my little notebook around whenever I have an idea during these periods of me-time. I found that I'm able to really understand and comprehend things when I turn off everything else and just be bored.
So when I hear something, think of something, or am reminded of something, I write it down. I write it either into my little yellow notebook or into my Evernote. The eventual thing I want is for all my ideas and thoughts to be catalogued and organized into my Dropbox account. On my desk is a literal pile of sticky notes, bar napkins, receipts, and valet tickets with jokes and observations that I started since the beginning of college. And day after day, I tell myself, "I gotta get all this typed up." But Idon't have the proper framework of how I want to go about organizing. I wrote up a draft, yet I've lost it... in my Evernote.
So how do I hunt for ideas? What I do is 1) Replay stuff I like on the screen so I can know the beats they took, 2) Replay the formula in my head (and in front of a mirror) the stuff I want to learn, and 3) Write the idea down for future-me.
When people ask, "How'd you come up with it?", I feel guilty. To say an example: Let's say I got a humorous idea in my head. I then go through my Evernote/notebook for other ideas annnddd... ding ding ding ding ding - got it! Alright, connect those two ideas together, but what technique should I employ? I remember that comic did a joke in this way - I can take that formula, apply it to my material, give it my own little spin to it, use that other guy's joke formula, combine them. Boom, done. Bombed? Alright, back to the drawing board. Why didn't that work? Edit, edit, edit. And so on.
The musician Prince had a "vault" - or as we call it, a "flash drive".
George Carlin had his "files" in a computer. Or as we call them, "notes".
Ben Franklin had a little notebook for ideas. Hence where he got his electric kite idea.
Brian Eno copies music formation techniques and wisdom nuggets and puts them into a stack of cards. He called it "oblique strategies" - http://stoney.sb.org/eno/oblique.html
If you want a good book on how people hunt ideas, I love the book "Originals" by Adam Grant.
Plus, my favorite web series to recommend about creativity is a blog called "Everything is a Remix"-
Nothing is original! Everything creative is a bunch of little pieces that are stolen, put together, and then doused in the brain fluid of the creator. Everything is stolen, everything's been done, nothing is original!
T H A N K S
News.Video.Poem
1. The geographic inequity of small business coronavirus aid - hey, wanna see the number breakdown of who got what based on geography???
2. Every COVID-19 commercial - hey, wanna see how companies are trying to look good during this pandemic???
For more videos, check out bit.ly/ThinkOfThis_Playlist
Silly Sh*t
Guys, follow me on Instagram @dnrtldg and there you'll find me making captions for ye' oldie paintings. It's a nice little daily brain exercise.
Guys, follow me on Reddit at [redacted]... I make long winded gifs... and I'm always on r/dankmemes...
Below is a photo of my current set up for writing my script. Here you go:
