To be creative we need to be comfortable with the limits of our knowledge
By learning new things, our world grows. This can be scary.
In Haruki Murakami’s book Dance Dance Dance, the main character meets a famous novelist, who observes:
“It didn’t use to be that way. The world was smaller, you could get a handle on things, you knew — or thought you knew — what you were doing.”
Does he talk about the world being smaller in the past from his personal perspective? Or is his observation about the way the world has changed over time, looking at it from a fixed point in time?
Both is true. The world is continuously growing in its complexity, accelerated by the global economy and the internet, which makes it feel like it’s more difficult to get a handle on things. We simultaneously live in our village and the whole world.
But what is more intriguing is that as we — as individuals — gain more knowledge, our personal map of references grows larger. In a bizarre way, gaining more knowledge makes us realise how little we know.
“The older I get, the less I know. It’s wonderful — it makes the world so spacious.” — Swami Chetanananda
The bliss and dangers of operating in a small world
When our world is small, anything seems possible.
Maybe that’s one of the reasons why many startups are founded by people at an early stage of their career. And the world needs people with ideas, whose vision is not yet obscured by all the obstacles that lie ahead.
But a wise startup founder is one that also recognises the limits of their world and hands over the reigns to others when the time is right to bring in new perspectives. Google, Microsoft, Amazon, and many other companies that grew out of startups did this well. Mark Zuckerberg and his advisors at Meta (née Facebook) have to yet come to this insight.
Operating within the small confines of your personal world while running a global business used by billions of people can have grave consequences.
When we need to grow our world to make a meaningful contribution
People setting out to do their PhD (to choose an example that I have personal experience with from both sides, having gone through this myself and having supervised many students on this journey), often believe they can change the world. In many cases this is what drives them to do a PhD.
But to make a meaningful contribution, they first need to narrow their scope. To do this, they have to expand their internal representation of the world — mostly by reading previously published literature relating to their topic. In design, this may also involve doing some initial design experimentation.
It is still possible to change the world by doing a PhD, but the change may be more targeted than initially anticipated. We all stand on the shoulders of giants after all; each PhD dissertation contributes a building block to form those giants.
Learning more about a topic area—whether through reading or experimentation—increases our knowledge but it also pushes out the boundaries of our world.
Growing and connecting multiple worlds
Studies of creative innovators (as recounted in books such as Messy and Creative Confidence) highlight the role that networks have played in their success. And this includes both social networks and knowledge networks.
Social networks can help us grow our knowledge network. Famous mathematician Paul Erdős was known to travel the world and sleep on the couch of colleagues, constantly finding new ideas by connecting with others and being exposed to different ways of thinking.
Charles Darwin, too, was a vivid traveller. He also engaged with many topics at once — studying medicine, natural science, geology, and economics — which led him to formulating his revolutionary theory of evolution as he was able to connect knowledge from different domains.
So what’s the lesson here for being creative and making a meaningful contribution—whether it’s through creating a startup, pursuing a PhD, or other initiatives?
First, we need to recognise the value of networks and travelling as a way to grow our knowledge within and across domains.
This is why it is so important for PhD candidates to present their research at conferences. (Something that has been severely impacted by the Covid-19 pandemic.) It is about connecting with people as much as it is about expanding our knowledge by seeing others present and being exposed to ideas outside our own area of expertise.
When we travel to foreign countries (whether for a conference or holiday), we are forced to unlearn things we know—like how to pay for a bus ticket or order a taxi. The simplest acts can reveal new insights and challenge existing assumptions.
Second, we need to be at ease with the idea of our world expanding as our knowledge grows.
It is widely acknowledged that when it comes to innovation, an important attitude is to not be afraid to fail. Every time we fail, we learn something new.
But what is less acknowledged is that by learning new things, our world grows, which can be scary.
We feel more comfortable living in a Truman world where we can clearly see the boundaries. As our world grows, it becomes more difficult to see how we can achieve change.
At the same time, the more knowledge we build up, the more dots we have to connect. And by growing our knowledge across multiple domains, we start being able to see and create new patterns that do not yet exist.
Third, we have to keep moving.
No matter what one does or the stage of one’s career, the art is to see both place and purpose as shifting constructs. As our worlds expand — whether due to external forces or internal shifts of our minds — we must adjust and keep moving.
“So what do I have to do?” Murakami’s antihero asks the Sheep Man — who in an eerie way controls the course of his life.
“Dance,” said the Sheep Man, “Yougottadance. Aslongasthemusicplays. Yougotta dance. … Yougottauseallyougot. Weknowyou’re tired, tiredandscared. Happenstoeveryone, okay? Justdon’tletyourfeetstop.”
I’m a Professor in the Design Lab and Director of Innovation at the University of Sydney. If you enjoyed this story, you might also be interested in our free online course Innovation through Design and our design methods handbook Design Think Make Break Repeat.
