Planning, Drugs and Alcohol

In my last blog, “Only Fools Charge In”, I talked about how the guy who didn’t think it through, didn’t analyze things as much, was too arrogant or ignorant than to know better is often the guy who comes up with the creative idea, the Next Big Thing…because he is forced to be creative after he charged in and got stuck.

As someone who lies at the other end of the spectrum (I like to plan, to analyze, to consider the odds of success before I start something), that seems a bit unfair. The don’t look before you leap guy, the ignorant and the arrogant are more likely to have that creative spark?

And then it got worse. I read this piece about writers and creativity:

“Choose your drug: alcohol, marijuana, mushrooms… Any one of these will make your writing better, especially if you’re writing something personal. Writing is only interesting to other people if it is deeply revealing. Your brain has a self defense mechanism which prevents you from divulging too much of yourself to perfect strangers. Fortunately, this mechanism can be easily bypassed with chemicals.”

So drinking and doing drugs might make you a better writer? Now I am really pissed since I do neither. And here I thought that was a good thing!

All this leads to troubling questions, questions that contradict everything we are taught: is it better to not plan, not analyze, not abstain from booze and drugs?

It is gratifying to know the answer is No to all those questions. Actually, let me rephrase: it’s statistically better for you to say No to all those questions. Because all the professions where saying Yes works (entrepreneurs, writers) are what Nassim Nicholas Taleb calls “scalable” professions, or winner-takes-all professions: for every Facebook, there are hundreds of start-ups that failed; for every JK Rowling, there are thousands of writers who barely make a dime. But in most other professions, things aren’t so skewed and pretty much everyone can win enough to have a good life (think engineering, medicine, law, accountancy, bureaucracy): and in all those professions, No is the right answer to the questions of the previous para.

As always, there are no universal answers. You just have to pick what works in that context. Which is what makes life so complicated. And interesting.