A Point of View

Notes on The Creative Act

Rick Rubin’s The Creative Act: A Way of Being is one of loveliest books to have by your bedside. It’s light enough to dip in and out of when the mood strikes. It’s also the most beautiful book I own, so it’s doing some good work there on its own either way.

The chapter I’ve been returning to is titled Point of View. It put a finger on something that I’ve been thinking about for a good while.

“A point of view is different from having a point.

A point is an idea intentionally expressed. A point of view is the perspective—conscious or unconscious—through which the work emerges.

What causes us to notice a piece of art is rarely the point being made. We are drawn to the way an artist’s filter refracts ideas, not to the ideas themselves.”

— Rick Rubin, The Creative Act

I’ve been thinking about this in both the positive and negative realm.

A film like Her made me think a lot more about AI, over a decade ago, than any futurist ever has. And for all the talk of choosing your attitude regardless of circumstance, who can forget Life is Beautiful? I could go on…

The other side of the coin is when I feel like someone is lecturing me. We’ve all been there. The person seems so intent on making their point and also wanting you to absorb it.

But the lecturer is unwittingly having the opposite effect of what they desire. The more they gesticulate, the less likely you are to shift. If anything, you feel even further away from their school of thought at the end of it.

“Great art is created through freedom of self-expression and received with freedom of individual interpretation.

Great art opens a conversation rather than closing it. And often this conversation is started by accident.”

— Rick Rubin, The Creative Act

The opening of a conversation is the fascinating part. If you’re able to create something that prompts independent thinking, that leads to collaborative conversations, then perhaps everyone leaves feeling a little bit better off.

I released a short missive here last week that I very nearly didn’t publish. Many of my previous essays were labours of love that I toiled over across a few days. While I’m proud of putting the lengthier, meatier pieces out there, I didn’t expect this almost whimsical post to open so many interesting conversations. So, thank you!

I enjoy sharing my writing online and this has prompted me to lower the bar for what I deem publishable. Less definitive, more of an opening.

“The goal of art isn’t to attain perfection. The goal is to share who we are. And how we see the world.”

— Rick Rubin, The Creative Act