How Can You Identify New and Compelling Ideas in the Information Age?
It’s all been said before
In the Information Age, writer’s block appears to be less about struggling to get words down on paper or screen and more about creating original content.
I sometimes read Seneca’s On the Shortness of Life and it’s one of those timeless works that — despite its own brevity — leaves me feeling like everything that needs to be said has already been said.
If all the answers have already been publicly shared, why do I need to share it as well?
It’s not only mainstream matters that suffer from market saturation. My academic life also leaves me feeling the satisfaction of like-mindedness alongside the dissatisfaction of never truly having a ‘new’ idea.
The good practice in academic research of performing a review of the studies and theories that have gone before leaves me feeling like there are no stones left unturned. So often my ‘original’ ideas are affirmed by others’ research studies. Someone else got there first.
But rather than assuming other people have a monopoly on those ideas, you can see your own work as supporting and affirming theirs.
There is power in this, as it becomes rich ground for collaborative pursuits. Even on the leading edge of disruptive thought, you can find peers who think along the same lines.
It also becomes the place where you actively look for gaps in existing knowledge rather than waiting for ideas to organically weave their way into your consciousness. Other experts also point to where there is room for development and iteration.
As a bonus, finding out you were not as original as you thought you were means that your ideas have social validity. They are not the result of you being a lone-wolf thinker. As a social animal, finding your peer group is reassuring even when you like to think outside the box — or even rip the boxes right apart.
For someone who considers themselves an ideas person, it began to dawn on me that the idiom “great minds think alike” is a blessing.
Not only does it mean you have the option to work alongside others who share your vision, it also means there is a ready audience with their own power to recruit new audience members. If an audience member has not yet discovered the knowledge you are sharing, you may be the one to facilitate their next step in life.
Your audience will also signpost you — sometimes explicitly, sometimes quietly. Sometimes via compliments and sometimes via criticism. Sometimes they will ask you questions and sometimes you will ask them questions.
The important thing to remember is not that someone has said it all before but that there is another living, breathing human that you are able to help right now by virtue of being a fellow living, breathing human that is able and willing to answer questions.
Perhaps the other person would ideally prefer a chat with Seneca, but that’s not on the plate. You are a messenger in your own right adding your own flavour to whatever message you’re serving.
Assuming the greatest minds have already had something to say on your issue also means (depending on your topic of expertise) you can identify historical figures who shared your passion.
Their insights not only serve to back up your own, but can also be the place where you find your own voice. Perhaps you provide a modern rendering of ancient or historical wisdom? Perhaps you reframe ideas that have stood the test of time as they apply to contemporary issues? Perhaps you blow my argument out of the water and tell me I’m behind the times because modern writers and philosophers have ample new material waiting in the synthetic technocracy?
Feeling like I had nothing new to say prevented me from sharing my work for a long time. I kept my writing locked away despite an enduring personal identity of Writer. I wondered if I should be content to withhold my work as private journals. I assumed I was suffering from perfectionism. It was actually closer to imposter syndrome, yet less a matter of identity or skill and more a matter of perceived value.
Meanwhile, I consumed the work of other writers who obviously did not have this hang-up. What was different about those writers?
The difference was that they published their work regardless. They didn’t worry that an eminent psychologist or investigative journalist or cutting-edge scientist or ancient philosopher had already said what they wanted to say and better. They understood that better was in the eye of the beholder.
I truly grasped this when I decided to write a book of life advice as a legacy for my children. It’s not about how many books or articles are already out there, but about the sense of connection you feel with the author. Ancient philosophers are all well and good, but can you really relate to them?
Instead of seeking originality we can seek to create content that reconceptualises and recontextualises and reconnects.
What new tone or interpretation can you lend to the subject at hand? What idiosyncrasies do you bring to the table? Why might somebody prefer to read the musings of a 21st century nobody (who is currently an actual somebody) to the wisdoms of a historical somebody (who is currently an actual nobody)?
We have to assume there’s an audience out there to hear what we have to say precisely because we are a living source of what is being said.
What you say is new because the thoughts are fresh even if the ideas are being refreshed.
What you say is compelling because it has the power to connect to real people in real time.
I might not be Plato or Plath, but I can share my own philosophy and poetry because I trust there is an audience that prefers my voice.
If we failed to do things merely because they’ve been done before, where would we be? We don’t live our daily lives by this concern and neither should we live our professions or passions by it.
Keeping the ideas mill turning is the lifeblood of the human intellect and the key to “know thyself” (spoken by Socrates and written down by Plato: a fine example of the importance of perpetuating what you have learnt).
We don’t need to be constantly developing the new; sometimes we need to be preserving and updating the old.
So, go ahead and share your unoriginal ideas! They might not be a brand new perspective but they will definitely be a brand new flavour.
