CM 240: Adam Alter on Simple Ways to Get Unstuck
Curious Minds at Work
The Creative Cliff Illusion and the Value of Perseverance
In the creative process, people often mistakenly believe that their best ideas will come early on because they come easily. However, research shows that these initial ideas are not particularly original or novel because they are shared by everyone. The real breakthrough occurs when individuals push through the difficulty of generating ideas, reaching what is known as the creative cliff. This is where truly innovative and unique ideas surface, diverging from the common pool of ideas. People tend to stop too early in the creative process due to a misconception that the difficulty signifies a decline in idea quality. The key insight is that perseverance and spending more time on a task often lead to the emergence of truly valuable and original ideas.
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