I like getting inspired a lot. It’s a wonderful feeling of finding your own voice in the reflection of something else; be it art, people, actions, books, or pictures. A thing gave you feelings and you found those feelings an outlet. Though most inspiration might as well be called stealing. For example, I watch a lot of YouTube. Like, embarrassingly a lot. Vlogs, gaming, animation, education, news, clips, food, music, art, 2am binging of cute animals. Everything. And lots of my blog posts are responses or prompts by videos I watch. But it’s a similar case for almost any medium I absorb, from Mistborn sounding more and more like my novel, to borrowing Late Night jokes for coworker banter.
People have these hang ups on originality but truthfully, I don’t think that has ever existed. The internet spawns such awesomely loyal creations like fanfiction or cosplay [an art themselves], but it’s also shows similar ideas are repeated, yet connect with audiences in much the same way. The relatively tiny population that watches GoT, uses Twitter, during the premier literally comes up with exactly the same joke at the exact same time.
Originality doesn’t even make sense in the grand history of humankind. 100,000 years spawned billions of humans, each with their own minds voice, screaming at them to create. Being completely original is laughable. Even this! I’m lamenting the creative process! What creative hasn’t poised these questions? Wondering if their work mattered. Wondering if it had been done before.
The lightbulb had multiple inventors. Euclid pretty much built all mathematics, yet still Newton had to find calculus himself. And the Indians, Mayans, Chinese, Egyptians, Zimbawe’s, and Ottomans each build massive astrology/scientific/mathematic/architectural libraries. Each anthology built, destroyed, discovered, and recreated. Shakespeare’s the Bard of every possible plot, joke, character, situation ever, while Hollywood still tries to reboots The Mummy.
Any phantom of originality is immediately quashed if you step into a museum, especially if it’s focused on history. I was wandering through the Museum of Natural History and had a strange premonition of the Egyptian Sphinx/Pharaoh archetype, as it influenced 1940s American furniture. Obviously, it was easily on display in the ancient Egyptian section [a culture that survived for 4,000 years! Longer than any continuous civilization today!] But the same image appeared in Ancient African tribes’ exhibit on a totem tucked in the corner.
No, originality is a parlor trick, a title granted to those who steal and borrow and recreate the same tired lines, over and over, until what was once considered great from OP has become your Groundhog’s Day. Then once every troupe has been retired, every sentenced frame, every question asked, every pickle rick-ed, can you even consider the idea of originality.
But fear not, for there is a much more achievable, relatable, and ultimately obtainable goal; authenticity. In fact, I would argue anyone can be authentic, you only need to trust yourself. Cast away self-doubt, self-criticism, any dreams of greatest or the mirage of being a star. Instead, practice. It’ll be garbage. Piles of trash that doesn’t deserve flaunting or audiences. That’s fine. We’ve dropped the pretense in the prior step. No, instead create the garbage you are almost ashamed of in secrecy, and hone and hone and grind until what you make isn’t garbage, but to you, is good enough. Take that, and pin it to your fridge. Tell yourself, there, that’s something that I, as an individual, think is…. Just alright. That’s my bar.
Create for yourself. Make things you think are okay.
If nothing else, you can be proud, for who was your greatest critic but yourself? And who have you just impressed? That’s world enough for me, that might as well be world enough for you. That’s true authenticity. Just a function of sloppy work and careful editing.
Careful readers will find that the path to Originality and Authenticity are the same, though the bar is vastly different. I admit, I don’t have much better advice to you than do. Keep doing. It’s not new advice, but it seems to do the trick.
Maybe I’m just asking you to settle. Maybe that’s all I’m asking of myself. Or maybe I have such the ego that I think my good enough is grandiose. I don’t really want to dwell on it, doesn’t matter anyway.