Inspiration, creativity, rejuvenation

[Norman Watts <Norman_Watts@zzzzzzz>]

Jennifer,

As a recreational carver and full-time researcher I can only think of
a vaguely analogous experience in my own life. As a graduate student
there came a time after five years of working six and even seven days
a week, and where it often wasn't late as long as it was still before
midnight, that I ran out of gas. Experiments were often negative or
inconclusive. Sometimes when I was despondent late at night I would
simply prepare some virus and sit at the electron microscope and look
at them and I would become very inspired and optimistic. So tiny and
yet such exquisite detail and function! At the same time I would
often find ideas, or come up with ones of my own, by going to the
library and reading the literature, often outside my field. But there
was a third part. About that time my brother invited me to visit him
in Quebec City. I went reluctantly (so much work to do!) and found
myself as if released from a bottle. Although I knew it
intellectually, it was a nevertheless a profound experience to
observe that not everyone worked until midnight. When I returned to
the lab it was close to writing up my thesis. To be honest there were
no great discoveries or bursts of energy. But, it seems in retrospect
there were three distinct elements involved. Pure inspiration came
 from observing something of greater creativity than my own, in my
case the results of millions of years of driven viral evolution.
Creativity on the other hand came from learning the work of others
and triangulating between their methods and observations.
Rejuvenation however came from doing something so removed from my day
to day that it felt like a revelation. Without the later the first
two eventually stopped flowing at some point. Perhaps its time to
earn the money in a different way before thinking that some 30 plus
shows a year are the best, and most importantly, the only way, of
doing things. You are not just a carver.

n