Nope, this isn’t a post bashing The Hunger Games. Calm down, lol. But it is a very real look at a scenario that many of us as writers (and creatives) go through. A nightmarish scenario, that can be soul-crushing and inspiration-sucking… but only if you allow it to be. Let’s talk, family.
Have you ever had a book idea that was SO hot, SO sexy, SO original (LOL, by the way) that you just *knew* that the moment you wrote it down, it was going to become a worldwide success and earn you a gajillion dollars? That people would hang your name in the stars as the most brilliant writer ever? That millions of aspiring authors worldwide would try to emulate your success?
Did you have this idea… only for someone to “steal” it (LMAO, by the way) and thus take your success?!
AARGH!! How DARE they?! How could they reach into your mind and steal your amazing, kick-ass idea? It’s YOUR idea!
Yah. I went through this foolish episode too. And I hope that like me, you sat up in your chair one day, blinked, and said: “Holy cow. I’m an idiot.”
I’m going to tell you a story, but before I do that…
Let me share with you some very simple and yet sometimes hard-to-
believe truths about being a creative in ANY field:
- Ideas are not original. Never. Ever. I know it’s hard to believe, but it’s the truth. It’s why I inserted a phat LOL behind my comment above. No idea has never been dreamed or thought before you dreamt or thought it.
- Ideas are a dime-a-dozen. I could sit here (and so could you) and come up with a hundred different novel and story ideas. We have so much to pick from around us, from the most trivial ideas to the most profound. The most ridiculous to the most sober. Furthermore, I GUARANTEE you someone (or hundreds of someones) has already come up with that same exact idea, and on that note…
- IDEAS CANNOT BE “STOLEN”! If you read the first two bullet points, you’ll also agree with me that the very concept of “stealing ideas” is preposterous in itself. You cannot “steal” something that is already in the ether
The whole finished product will always trump the individual contribution of separate elements. I’ll go into more detail about this in a minute.
- And, get ready for it, EVERY CREATIVE, no matter what field he’s in, draws some sort of influence from another creative or another creative work, whether he knows it or not.
- And MOST IMPORTANTLY, your brilliance as a creative shines through in your execution of your idea. Again, I’ll go into this, but first, I’m going to tell you a story of something that happened that drove home all of these points for me as a creative writer. That story is about…
The SMASH hit “The Hunger Games”… and How it Was the BEST “Worst” Event of My Life as a Creative Writer
I gotta head out to work, but stay tuned for this story in part 2 of this post!
But in the meantime, what do you think? 🙂 Can ideas be stolen, creativity sucked away from an original source? Or do we all get our inspiration from a shared creative ether? Post your thoughts, below and stay tuned for the second part of the post: the story of how The Hunger Games changed my creative perspective as a writer and entrepreneur!
Keep it indie,
<3 Colby