Everyone's a Genius, Everyone's a Lemming

And other epiphanies from the book everyone's reading.

A few weeks ago, I went to dinner with friends who were visiting from out of town. At the end of the night, we piled into a car, buzzy and chatty, infused with the unmistakable glow of time spent in excellent company.

“What is that book?” asked one friend, as we drove past a bookstore.

“What book?”

“That book!” she pointed. “The circle book!”

“Oh yeah, that book. I’ve seen it everywhere,” another friend chimed in.

I craned my neck to see the display in question, but it was no longer in sight.

Every time I see it, I think it should be called The Tao of Boob. I know that’s a record. But we see what we see.

A quick internet search revealed it to be the #1 New York Times bestseller The Creative Act: A Way of Being, by legendary music producer Rick Rubin.

Indeed, I had heard of it — over the course of that week, no less than four people had mentioned it (including next week’s guest for Five Big Questions), not counting the numerous write-ups I’d seen around the internet.

Rubin himself is the stuff of myth. Bearded, preferably barefoot, possessing no technical or musical knowledge, but a well-honed intuition and a mystical sensibility. Much like the artists he works with, the book’s cover feels poised to become an icon. Minimalist, sans dust jacket, with one imposing circular graphic, it resembles a spiritual text more than a modern manual.

“Oh, this book,” said the guy at the register, when I decided to snag my own copy. “It’s flying off the shelves! It must be good.”

“Good” is subjective.

Within the first few pages, I was reminded of The War of Art, The Artist’s Way, Big Magic, The Art of Noticing, and the Tao Te Ching. (For what it’s worth, all books I recommend.) The similarities were not subtle. Having just paid $32 for a linen bound hardcover, I wanted to shout, “The emperor has no clothes!” But what this particular emperor lacks in apparel he more than makes up for in lore. So, I kept reading.

The book is brilliant, full of thoughts and observations to stir deep reflection or help burst out of a creative rut. It’s also rambling and reductive.

The true genius of the book may be unintended — a piece of art, about art, subject to all the same rules and reactions it seeks to explore.

“If you’ve truly created an innovative work, it’s likely to alienate as many people as it attracts,” Rubin writes. “The best art divides the audience. If everyone likes it, you probably haven’t gone far enough.”

Touché.

In the confidence of its convictions, The Creative Act called to mind another work, Ralph Waldo Emerson’s “Self-Reliance,” which will forever be among my favorite essays.

“I read the other day some verses written by an eminent painter which were original and not conventional. The soul always hears an admonition in such lines, let the subject be what it may. The sentiment they instill is of more value than any thought they may contain. To believe our own thought, to believe that what is true for you in your private heart is true for all men — that is genius. Speak your latent conviction, and it shall be the universal sense; for the inmost in due time becomes the outmost… Else, tomorrow a stranger will say with masterly good sense precisely what we have thought and felt all the time, and we shall be forced to take with shame our own opinion from another.”

Everyone who’s ever spent any time in a conference room, at a party, around a table with family, etc. knows the feeling well: your own thought is blasted back at you, often by someone louder and more self-confident. And everyone reacts as though they just split the atom.

The moral, of course, is SAY THE THING. Share the idea percolating inside you. Microphone and soapbox optional.

Once upon 2006, Rhonda Byrne penned the film and companion book The Secret, knowing full well it was an interpretation of the work of Wallace Wattles, Neville Goddard, Madame Blavatsky, and Norman Vincent Peale. She even told us so.

The book’s derivative roots go even deeper. The three-step process she presents for bringing dreams to life, “Ask. Believe. Receive.” is a barely disguised version of the Bible’s Matthew 21:22, “Whatsoever ye shall ask in prayer, believing, ye shall receive.”

It went on to become a #1 bestseller.

In The Creative Act, Rubin posits that material is all around us, our part is merely to remain open to receive it. “Everyone is a creator,” the thesis goes. If we function as a clear channel, “material is allowed through us.” Ideas function independently. They may visit multiple people; someone else may run with the same thread, albeit in a different direction.

Whenever I encounter a “reinterpreted” idea, I wonder how it came to pass. I’d venture that an equal number of people a) arrive at their concepts independently, believing them to be fully original; b) subconsciously latch onto something they’ve heard before, without realizing it’s repurposed; and c) deliberately manipulate a borrowed concept, hoping to pass it off as new.

The world may be big, but its material is limited. As long as one doesn’t plagiarize or otherwise attempt to steal another’s work, we can only expect some amount of overlap. What feels to one reader like the duh heard round the world will, to another, strike a chord of revelation.

The same message delivered fifteen ways will speak to fifteen different people. So again, SAY THE THING, but say it differently. Say it as only you can.

These lemmings have not yet read the circle book, but they cannot wait.

I’m fascinated by the glimpses of Rubin in podcasts and primetime interviews and docu-series, and was hoping the book might yield more of him. For a piece committed to boldness and bravery, The Creative Act contains few personal stories and even less in the way of vulnerability.

This brings me to my one big issue with the book, which has nothing to do with its contents. As I read, it begged the question of whether, say, a woman would be permitted to pen the same type of tome — 400+ pages of philosophizing — without anchoring its pages in the bearing of her soul?

Divided into 78 “areas of thought” averaging three pages apiece, it is a work to nibble and savor rather than hungrily gulp. The structure is best described as a steady drip of truth. Sentence after sentence yields kernel after kernel, like a popcorn garland intent on circling the globe.

Here are some personal favorites:

“It’s helpful to work as if the project you’re engaged in is bigger than you.”

“When we sit down to work, remember that the outcome is out of our control. If we are willing to take each step into the unknown with grit and determination, carrying with us all of our collected knowledge, we will ultimately get to where we’re going. This destination may not be one we’ve chosen in advance. It will likely be more interesting.”

“The magic is not in the analyzing or the understanding. The magic lives in the wonder of what we do not know.

There are also many takeaways for those who may not identify as creators. Managers, collaborators, team members, and traders of feedback, take note:

“When sharing observations, specificity creates space. It dissipates the level of emotional charge and enables us to work together in service of the piece.”

“If someone chooses to share feedback, listen to understand the person, not the work. People will tell you more about themselves than about the art when giving feedback. We each see a unique world.”

Thirty-two bucks and about as many hours later, this is what I’m left with: We are all geniuses; we are all lemmings.

Truth is simple and universal. Whether we present our ideas through the lens of an artist or a teacher or a parent or a preacher or a nine-time Grammy winning producer, the true value is often in our delivery. Creation is for everyone. And as long as humans exist, we’ll keep finding (and marketing) new ways to say it.

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If you’d like to hear me read this week’s issue aloud (and listen for the hidden dog cough) the audio version is available here.

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Card of the Week

Here is this week’s card for the collective, as well as some thoughts to carry into the days ahead. As most modern readers will tell you, the tarot is not about fortunetelling, nor is it about neat, definitive answers. The cards are simply one path to reflection, a way of better knowing ourselves and others through universal themes. If this reading resonates with you, great! And if not, no worries. Take whatever may be helpful and leave the rest.

Featuring The Wild Unknown Tarot by Kim Krans

The Six of Wands has a question. What if success isn’t a state, but a feeling?

Before we get down to discussing the nature of success, this card would like us to define it. Not necessarily the way we’ve been taught, or how society describes it, but how this idea blossoms within us.

If the Six of Wands had its way, it would like us to do away with the word entirely, to replace it with something rounder, more expansive. “Success” doesn’t need to be tied to financial, commercial, or popular results. Let us instead seek for meaning. Glory. Wholeness.

What if all this time, we’ve been sold the idea that success is an outcome, when it’s really a frame of mind? When you’ve done what resonated with you. When your actions align with your values. When you feel okay about what you have going on, regardless of how it appears on the outside.

Featuring the iconic Smith-Waite Tarot, with art by Pamela Colman Smith

Traditionally, this card shows a person on horseback, doing a victory lap while sporting a crown of laurels. Chronologically wedged between the Five of Wands (a card that denotes internal struggle) and the Seven of Wands (about how tumult often manifests externally), the Six of Wands tells a story of how success can be, and often is, a moment that arrives between those that feel like its polar opposite.

Success as an event may be fleeting. Success as an attitude has no limit.

For most of us, adulthood comes with more demands than gold stars. But whether you’re accustomed to receiving positive reinforcement or not, the Six of Wands is proud of you. It wants you to feel proud, too.

The energy of this card flies high. It rises above. From this vantage point, it sees your intentions. It recognizes how you try. Wherever you may be in the process, however your efforts have been received, it knows that you, as a human, are worthy of praise. And in the days ahead, it asks you to acknowledge that.

All too often, we allow our success to be defined by external forces. Whether we get the gig, job, promotion. Whether our audience reacts in the way we hope. Whether we are met with validation.

One favorite quote comes from the inimitable Lorrie Moore in this New Yorker interview: “Validation is for parking tickets.”

Do not seek validation outside yourself. Do not seek confirmation of your immutable, inherent worth. It can be tempting to seek external feedback, but the Six of Wands promises there is no need. What if, simply by showing up and remaining true to our vision, we have already succeeded?

In the coming days, this card invites us to consider: What if success isn’t a destination, but a concept? What if it’s a feeling? What if, regardless of outside influences, you can summon it right now?