Intentionality

The root of creative frustration is in the inverse relation between intention and ingenuity. Try, and you’re on the wrong foot; at least, if you’re grasping for the marvelous stuff, content that drops out of your fingers like gold and feels less like composing and more like channeling.

To wait for these moments is to bet on the whims of manic episodes. While sustainable, in that burnout cycles don’t exist given the space between episodes, it isn’t productive or even all that pleasurable. Mania tends to be invigorating for the brief moment it lasts, and then depressing when it ends, the months between dragged long with self-doubt and lazy guilt.

A crucial distinction to make is that not all creative work is actually “creative.” Constructive work is made up of some combination of intention and ingenuity: the gold is born of ingenuity, but craft is honed by intention. Approaching creative projects with the intention of producing ingenuity is a sure way to choke the genius, but turning our intention toward craft will pay off in dividends when the genius does decide to speak.

Art can be assessed on its balance of genius and craft.

Gabriel García Márquez’ One Hundred Years of Solitude was translated into English by Gregory Rabassa. Márquez called Rabassa’s translation better than the original Spanish text.

I think what’s at play here is a matched synthesis of intention and ingenuity. A translator is a craftsman, working an intimate knowledge of languages into accurate interpretations and rhythmic, vibrant prose while ultimately at the service of the original ingenuity. If we take Márquez at his word, then the amoebic brilliance of One Hundred Years of Solitude’s found perfected form in Rabassa’s translation.

Outsider artists’ balance leans heavily toward genius; Pop songwriters’ leans toward craft.

The takeaway is that the artist should not work as slave to the genius, pacing the room in wait, killing time expectantly. Time between inspiration is best filled with intentional focus on craft, so that when you strike gold you know how to forge it.