All kinds of assumptions can masquerade themselves as rules to live your life by. A comment from a teacher that you’ve never forgotten. A suggestion you read in a self-help book. Advice from a boss. A quote from someone you admire and follow on Instagram.
Or maybe even something you read in The Jolt 😇.
The point is, assumptions that look like rules, are everywhere.
They can give us a nudge when we need one, create a framework from which to bounce from, provoke us to think in a different way, or stop us from doing something really daft - which a few of us wish we’d paid more attention to when younger.
The danger is when we hold these assumptions to be definitive - as rules.
An amazing mentor once told me that ideas, ambitions and passions, in their early stages, are like paper-thin glass, unformed and fragile. Sometimes, no more than a feeling. A fuzzy vision of what we want to create in our lives. Some call it our search for meaning.
Regardless of what we call it, we carry these ideas, ambitions and passions in the crucible of our hearts. One day, I will bring this all to life.
But all it takes is for someone we trust to say…”Don’t do that!”, “Do it like this”, or “Don’t approach it that way”.
And something in our heart sinks. We feel that crucible crack, because we trust their assumption of our lives more than we do our own.
And we treat that assumption like a rule.
Maybe I shouldn’t do this. It’s not how things are done.
It’s at these times, at the birth of our ideas, that we encourage you to be careful. These are the times that our delicate ideas can crack, or worse, drop to the ground and smash.
Creativity is the most important human resource in the world. Without it, there would be no progress.
Having worked in the creative business my whole life, where ideas are the only currency of exchange, I’ve developed a mantra for my early ideas;
“Be careful what you share, with whom, and when”.
And it’s especially true when you’re sharing ideas with the colleagues you are closest too, or the people in your life that you love. Some will get you for who you are, but many simply don’t want to see you fail or get hurt.
The assumptions they make about you come from a place that’s good in their intention - but can be clouded and riddled with unspoken caution. And if that assumption holds for long enough, caution can become the rule.
It’s why Picasso once said, “The chief enemy of creativity, is good sense”.
I have a circle of people who I first unfold my ideas too. They’re an uncommonsensical bunch, becuase I know they treat ideas with the fragility and care they deserve at first.
Let your ideas grow in you for a bit, and then choose your first audiences wisely.