Saturday, August 28, 2010

Platform from which to create

From "Dreaming with God" (Bill Johnson) Pg 47:
[...] Most great ideas are actually the offspring of other concepts. Years ago I bought a jazz album on a whim. I eagerly looked forward to something fresh and new as I placed the album on the turntable. But I was horribly disappointed. It sounded like a child randomly pounding on a piano, with no melody or harmonies, no consistent rhythm, nothing to give it purpose or direction. Coincidentally, I found a magazine article by the same musician a year or so later. In that magazine he described a particular season of his life in which he tried to be completely original, without being influenced by any other musicians. He referred to it as a dark season of his life. It was obvious to me that I had purchased the bad fruit of his bad season. He went on to give what has become for me a profound lesson on creativity. He said that to really be creative he had to go back to what he had learned from others, and use that as a platform from which to create.
Wow, sometimes I think I try too hard to do something different. In fact, sometimes the difference between awesome chicken rice and normal chicken rice is the pandan leaf. What if God is giving us the small keys that will make a huge difference? What if we are the small key?

2 comments:

jasper said...

as an aside, chicken rice is usually not served with pandan leaf, maybe things are different in the us!

shaowei said...

oh :) i meant to say that some people cook their chicken rice with pandan leaves in the cooker.