Why You ShoulD Trace Your Creative Lineage - AnD How To Do It ( Part II )

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How to Trace Your Creative Lineage

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In Part I, I talked about why great creators trace their lineage: in order to understand the legacies before them, so as to make theirs independent and worth remembering. 

One great way to do this is to seek out your favorites' favorites {and least favorites}. By tracking who inspired your inspirations, you're discovering a creative legacy that you may have never encountered, but might indirectly affect your own work. 

Here are two other ways to trace your own creative lineage: 

2. Keep a Commonplace Book

A commonplace book is a collection of ideas that you gather from various sources, for safe-keeping. Collect quotes, paintings, business ideas, book lists you want to read, HTML code you always need to reference, favorite fonts, book passages, online articles, stellar recipes, people to research more - whatever. The point is to fill it with what you find valuable. 

You most likely won't use every tidbit, but it will never be lost or forgotten this way. And forgetting an idea is probably the worst feeling in the world. 

Whether your commonplace book is a Microsoft Word document, a leather-bound journal, or a case of flashcards makes no difference.  

I use a GoogleDoc. Currently, it's about 60 pages long and expanding about 20 pages a week. Because I'm working on a novel, most of my content lately has been literary passages that I love, 'Words & Names I like', and self-publishing resources.

A great benefit to keeping a Commonplace Book is that by cataloging my ideas and information, I don't have to worry about remembering it. Commonplace books let you clear your mind to find new things or reference old ones again. 

In addition, typing up past notes is a great way to revisit and cement them into your mind. I read a book each week and usually end up taking a fair amount of notes by hand first and then typing them up. In doing so, it's like experiencing my thinking process as I read the book a few hours or days earlier. 

If you keep a Commonplace Book, you'll join a club of creators - good and great:

• Leonardo Da Vinci
  
• Guillermo Del Toro
  
• Ryan Holiday
  
• Ayn Rand

• Bill Gates
  
• H.P. Lovecraft
  
• John Stuart Mill
  
• Ronald Reagan
  

3. Form Your Own Imaginary Council

In his epic self-help book, Think and Grow Rich, Napoleon Hill outlines the idea of an Imaginary Council. 

This great article by Art of Manliness should be required reading. By forming your own council, staffed by your inspirations, heroes, and even adversaries, you'll be able to push yourself closer to establishing your own creative legacy. 

Treat who you select to be on your council like a job. If you do it well, researching and understanding the great creators of the past whom you want to guide your own work, you'll be able to accelerate your progress.*

*I myself have not formed my own imaginary council, but stay tuned for that! I have some drafting to do. 

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