Antennas and Creativity

Potential creative inputs are all around you. Are you on the right frequency?

Photo by Kew Li Wen on Unsplash

Have you ever stopped to think about how much electromagnetic radiation is passing through you right now? In a very real sense, information is passing through you all the time.

Of course, this flow of information through the world also exists in a less literal sense. I’ve been thinking about this recently in the context of fostering creativity after listening to a few conversations with Rick Rubin. Rubin, who is one of the most famous record producers alive, has been on the podcast circuit discussing his new book, The Creative Act: A Way of Being, that came out early this year. In both conversations I listened to, I was inspired by Rick’s way of approaching the world and the practices that he uses to maximize his opportunities for inspiration and awe.

One of the many amazing things about Rick is the astoundingly wide array of artists from different genres that he has worked with. There is something special about the way that he is able to tune his own creativity to sync up with a particular genre and then work with an artist to create something that is uniquely special and suited to their niche.

This got me thinking about a tool from my engineering toolbox: antennas. Antennas are everywhere but you probably don’t pay much attention to them since you don’t directly interact with them much. You’re probably familiar with the old rabbit ears that you may have seen behind a TV in classic movies, or the Yagi-Uda antennas that can still be seen sporadically on rooftops, especially in more rural areas. But today you’re probably more familiar with the flat antennas you hook up to your TV to pull in digital signals for over-the-air TV broadcasts or the antennas on your wireless router or phone.

Antennas aren’t one-size-fit-all. They are very carefully designed and tuned to optimally receive signals at a specific frequency or wavelength. If the tuning isn’t just right, then the signal can’t be efficiently received. One well known example of this tuning (or mistuning) was the antennagate kerfuffle on the iPhone 4. If the user held the phone such that they bridged the gap in the sleek metal antenna wrapped around the exterior of the phone, the antenna performance degraded and caused connection issues.

What frequency are you tuned to?

The biggest lesson I took away from the interviews with Rick is that the raw materials for creativity are all around us. They are in the air we breathe, the music we listen to, and the art we see. We consume a massive amount of content every day but are often hearing without understanding, seeing without perceiving; living with dulled hearts, ears that cannot hear, and eyes that are closed. In other words, our antennas aren’t tuned.

We are missing opportunities every day for creative inspiration because we are not tuned in. We are just as unaware of the creative ideas passing through us as we are of the radio signals connecting our computers and phones.

This week I want to share three ways to better attend to the wonder of the world around us. These three ideas are likely not new to you, but my hope is that you’ll revisit them with a fresh perspective this week. Leaning into our senses is a great way to better attend to the world; finding ways to see, listen, and experience the world in new ways. I hope these ideas will help you to experience the world more deeply and find new ways to spark your own creativity.

1. Put on a new pair of lenses by spending time with kids

Rubin shares how the way he experiences the world changes when he is walking with his son compared to when he is walking alone. While walking alone he might stop along the way to take a photo or jot down a quick note. But when he walks with his son, the walk will often be punctuated with interruptions as his son is drawn to examine even ordinary objects along the way.

I find that my kids often help me to see the world in new ways too, breaking me free from my own callousness to the wonder of the ordinary. Even the most common and everyday objects are delightful to them. And why shouldn’t they be? Even the simplest blade of grass, rock, or leaf is full of beauty. Simple at first glance, yet endlessly complex if you spend the time to dwell on it.

2. Listen and read broadly

One of the things that amazes me about Rubin is the breadth of artists that he has worked with. And not just worked with, but worked with at a high level to the tune of 9 Grammys. From Jay-Z and Eminem to Adele, the Red-Hot Chili Peppers, and Johnny Cash, it’s clear that Rick’s insights translate across genres.

One way that you can expand your creativity is to regularly try new things outside your comfort zone. This bias toward action and embrace of failure is a key disposition of the prototyping mindset. This week I’ve been digging into country and jazz playlists on Spotify. What is a genre of music that you don’t often listen to? Dial up a playlist of what people who love that genre say is the best of the best and put it on in the car for your next drive.

What we create is downstream from what we consume. If you’re looking to improve your creativity, try something out of your normal!

3. Experience Nature

In his interview with Ezra Klein, Rubin says:

It seems to me that all man-made art is a reflection back to our first energetic feelings of what’s stimulating to us.

What a great framing of creativity; realizing that the creative act is more about reflecting what we’ve experienced instead of creating something from an unknown place deep inside of us without any external influences.

From our mother’s face when we first arrive on this pale blue dot to the power of the ocean or the calm of the stars on a clear summer night, nature inspires us. When we connect with the natural world, we are inspired to see its great beauty.

As a Christian, I see the beauty of nature as God’s handiwork. The Psalms are full of references to the magnificent power, complexity, and depth of meaning in the natural world. The opening verses of Psalm 19 put it well:

The heavens declare the glory of God,
    and the sky above proclaims his handiwork.
Day to day pours out speech,
    and night to night reveals knowledge.

Regardless of what or who you believe is behind the beauty of nature, we can share in its awe and wonder. Getting out into nature helps us to put things in perspective—both to see our own weakness and to marvel at the wonder of life.

So what?

The blessing and curse of our modern age is the unprecedented amount of information we have at our fingertips. While the raw material for creative inspiration is more accessible than ever, the algorithmically-powered web often creates silos by feeding us more of what it thinks we like instead of helping us to branch out.

This week, consider intentionally tuning in to something different in order to pique your curiosity. You might just be surprised at the inspiration that’s been right in front of you.

---

The Book Nook

Jayber Crow is the second Wendell Berry novel that I’ve read, following my initial exposure to Berry through Hannah Coulter. Set in the fictional rural town of Port William, Kentucky, Berry explores themes of community and the meaning of life through what he calls the “membership.”

What I most appreciate about Berry’s writing in what I’ve read so far is the way that he connects to deep human themes related to friendship, community, and the impact of technology in a continually changing culture.

Jayber Crow follows the title character through his journey away and back to Port William. One of the themes that resonated with me as I was reading was the impact of technology on relationship. While the specific technological shift in the novel is from a man- and animal-powered agriculture to one powered by machines, I was struck by how much of the analysis could be mapped on to our current conversations about the impact of the smartphone, social media, and artificial intelligence.

Berry shows how technology can help to extend our abilities, but all too often at the cost of our humanity and relationships. The struggle between Troy and his father-in-law Athey pits the all-too-familiar attitude of maximizing productivity against the old-school approach of respecting our limits and pursuing contentedness.

Quotes to Ponder

A few quotes that resonated with me:

Jayber reflecting on the way that his new automobile (a Lincoln Zephyr) impacted the way he saw the world.

I confess that I heard this with a sense of guilt, for by the time Troy began to say such things I had bought the Zephyr and had succumbed to something of the same impatience. My wonderful machine sometimes altered my mind so that I, lately a pedestrian myself, fiercely resented all such impediments on the road. Even at my sedate top speed of forty miles an hour, I hated anything that required me to slow down. My mind raged and fumed and I cursed aloud at farmers driving their stock across the road, at indecisive possums, at children on bicycles. Ease of going was translated without pause into a principled unwillingness to stop. Hadn’t I been there and didn’t I know it? And so, self-accused, having begun by resenting the insult to Athey, I ended by yielding Troy a little laugh and a nod of understanding, which shamed me and did not make me like him any better.

On Troy’s attitude toward farming (compared with Athey’s).

His question was what his equipment could do, not what the farm could stand.

Jayber’s reflections upon approaching one of his professors in seminary, knowing that the professor would be straightforward with the truth as he saw it. How often are we afraid to engage with those who we know will tell us the truth?

And so finally, late one afternoon, I went to the professor I was afraid to go to, old Dr. Ardmire. I was afraid to go to him because I knew he was going to tell me the truth.

---

The Professor Is In

This week marks the last lab in E80 before the students pivot to focus on their final projects. In the final lab they’re back working with their robots doing calibration of the inertial measurement unit and GPS along with testing out a proportional control algorithm to set and maintain a desired depth for their robots underwater.

This Friday, before we all take off for a much-needed spring break, we’ll launch their final project where they will design an robot to launch into the bay at Dana Point in order to perform autonomous data collection using custom-built sensors. It’s always a fun point in the semester to see how far the students have come and how much they have learned in a little less than two months!

---

Leisure Line

Here’s some cupcakes I made this weekend for my wife’s birthday. Part of my #SaturdayScience baking campaign. The recipe was from Sally’s Baking Addiction: Perfect Vanilla Cupcakes. Cake flour is clutch for a fluffy cake.

---

Still Life

A shot from the north side of campus this last week at the snow-capped mountains. The photo doesn’t do it justice.