Every new idea is just a mashup or a remix of one or more previous ideas. Here’s a trick they teach you in art school. Draw two parallel lines on a p… - Austin Kleon

Every new idea is just a mashup or a remix of one or more previous ideas.

There’s the first line, the second line, but then there’s a line of negative space that runs between them. See it? 1 + 1 = 3.

If you believe in the lone genius myth, creativity is an antisocial act, performed by only a few great figures — mostly dead men with names like Mozart, Einstein, or Picasso. The rest of us are left to stand around and gawk in awe at their achievements.

Become a documentarian of what you do. Start a work journal: Write your thoughts down in a notebook, or speak them into an audio recorder. Keep a scrapbook. Take a lot of photographs of your work at different stages in your process. Shoot video of you working. This isn’t about making art, it’s about simply keeping track of what’s going on around you. Take advantage of all the cheap, easy tools at your disposal — these days, most of us carry a fully functional multimedia studio around in our smartphones

Be boring. (It's the only way to get work done.)