Creativity is a virtue of the stupid

Think about that for a second.

The process of logic can (and does) deliver great outcomes that make significant economic and social impacts.  People who just get things done through running the logical process to its end are more often than not thought of as being smart.  So by definition, someone not following logic is stupid (the opposite of smart), right?

However it’s from illogic that most real creativity flourishes, so isn’t creativity then, a virtue of the stupid?

Current constructs mostly force individuals and professionals into the game of following a set process of logic.  It’s not as if the ability to interrupt a process in order to generate a new pathway to better outcomes isn’t available.  The problem is that the process of logic puts up barriers to ideas and makes venturing into the unknown too uncomfortable and challenging.

Where would we be though, if nobody started the process of generating new logic from the simple, higher concept of asking “what if”?

What if the inventors of YouTube allowed logic of the day to dictate that sharing gazillions of terabytes of video over internet bandwidths that only recently had delivered nothing more than text and pictures would never work?

What if current logic had let the inventors of Facebook (whoever you believe it was/they were) tell them there was no way half a billion people would one day connect over a web platform?

What if Richard Branson hadn’t challenged current logic that a single brand couldn’t transfer its meaning across a range of industries, and that space travel will always be a state-sponsored activity for scientific purposes?

You can, of course, apply this concept in multiple ways (building a brand, an offer, product, entrepreneurial ventures, small business, marketing tactics, etc.) and if creativity is a virtue of the stupid, then I’m down with that.

NB. As a footnote, I’m not saying that I like or dislike any of these ideas; they merely illustrate my point.  If you huff at them, and say “yeah, but…” and argue against the premise, then that’s fine and in a way you’re also proving my point.

** republished from The Polished Turd (thepolishedturd.com), first published 20 December 2010