No doubt you’ve seen a catchy quote or two posted on Facebook or Twitter, etc. All too often the quotes are thrown up without real thought either by well-meaning folks or by those who are simply trying to look good. Either way, many parroting bobbleheads will share and retweet on reflex.
One quote I recently came across from Ray Bradbury says, “Don’t think. Thinking is the enemy of creativity. It’s self-conscious, and anything self-conscious is lousy. You can’t try to do things. You simply must do things.” At first glance one might think Mr. Bradbury was being reckless and suggesting we should always act without thinking. The parroting bobbleheads will repost with the idea that if Ray Bradbury said it then it must be good and true.
Anyone who would post or repost this quote by itself might as well be quoting Yoda (remember, Yoda is a fictional character who was referring to The Force, a mystical, metaphysical power that directly depends on one’s concentration of Midi-chlorians to really be useful. Jedi’s and Siths have loads of them, lesser beings not so much).
Back in the real world there is hope for us lesser beings. Mr. Bradbury wasn’t trying to be an arrogant jerk boasting that the answer to life was easy. On the contrary, he was divulging one of the most important secrets any writer could know and every writer should embrace, that in the context of FIRST DRAFTS, let it rip. Open the flood gates and allow the words to pour forth. It’ll be messy, for sure, like a giant turd – na, let’s stay positive and go with a mountain of clay. It may look daunting at first, but as you start cutting away and shaping, some of the excess will be discarded forever but a lot of it can be saved for other uses – back story, story ideas for subsequent works, story ideas that are actually better than what you first had in mind.
In the end you can be a parroting bobblehead and “share” the quote without thinking, you can reject the quote or, worse, argue why it’s untrue, or you can look it up and with context and maybe discover something wonderful. As we’re so often told, it’s, “Your choice.” 😉
