The Stuff of Inspiration

I have a theory. Like many of my other theories this one is also based on an entirely unoriginal & mundane idea. I have often wondered how different people have managed to inspire themselves to do a lot of things that they have done. Often while reading interviews of great writers, inventors, et al, it is usually a very common question which pops up on an average 15 minutes into the interview - what has inspired your work? Most people give generic answers & list other people's works or ideas. They speak about their influence on the way they think & approach their process. But all this is merely deflection. What is the true source of inspiration which makes use of that influence, what springs us into action to do some of our greatest works?

Bored.

To take a shot, without any fear of missing the point, I think the biggest personal motivator for people to move on & do their best work might be - dramatic pause - 'Boredom'.

I read Joseph's Brodsky's interview where he analyzes the idea of boredom. Another article on Boredom. Brodsky terms boredom as a 'psychological sahara' - that starts right into our boredom & spurns the horizon. The most important part about boredom that he mentions is about humility.

Boredom is a minion of time. It is a realization of the existence of time behind everything that we do. It allows time to invade into our minds, to hack into our regular thoughts & slow it down to a grind. It makes us believe in our finite existence. Since time has plenty of time to just go & on, we as humans who benchmark our lives to time, follow it helplessly & also hopelessly. There is always this ticking clock inside us, the number of breaths we take in our entire life time, the number of heartbeats, the number of hours of sleep we allow ourselves to get, the number of minutes of workout, the amount of time we spend at work, the amount of time we devote to our leisure. It is more ruthless than money & the advantages of economizing on time far out-weigh those of economical use of money.

This finite life form versus an infinite force, forces us to realize our insignificance in the entire scale of time. If we try to visualize one human being's existence on the so far known scale of time, we would be measured in million nano meter units. But thats not the point. The point of boredom is not it's existence, but the thoughts that it brings to our minds about ourself & about our abilities. What we can & cannot do with that time!

To quote Brodsky, "If it takes will-paralyzing boredom to bring your insignificance home, then hail the boredom. You are insignificant because you are finite. Yet infinity is not terribly lively, not terribly emotional. Your boredom , at least, tells you that much. And the more finite a thing is, the more it is charged with life, emotions, joy, fears, compassion."

I'd like to imagine, though inaccurately, how the typical life of an average prehistoric human would have been 500,000 years ago. Hunting & foraging for food & spending large pockets of time during the day doing, well, absolutely nothing. There would be a spurt in activity for specific times during the day for hunting & collecting, but beyond that, due of lack of any civilized construct to follow, there would be nothing left to do. True idleness in the wilderness. Now the idea of Psychological Sahara becomes a wonderful metaphor to show the limits of activity in an ocean of nothing. What would this prehistoric human, with an outsized brain & the ability to walk upright do in times of complete nothingness? I just have to look at this computer screen right now to imagine what that human must have done. Because that human was bored with a unique circumstance to actually feel the boredom, he might have spawned an entire process of innovation by mere observation & re-invention. I have heard that necessity is the mother of invention, but who is the father? Among many candidates & due of lack of DNA profiling, I assume it is boredom. An entire thought process developed due the insecurity that boredom creates. We have leaped from a stone tool to an iPad. The sophistication of such a thought only seems to have emerged from something very primal to us.

Why is it that such a vital part of our thought process remains so under appreciated? Well it is in fact not under appreciated, it is acknowledged every single time we check our email, check our BBM's, check our apps on a smartphone, watch a film, use drugs, do mind blowing work, basically get busy. It is everywhere. It is the exact opposite state of focused activity.

I'd read somewhere that, 'Adversity introduces a man to himself only if he allows it to'. What better adversity than being bored to death, unable to lift even a toe in any direction. Well the most important thing about boredom is that it doesn't kill - at least physiologically & whatever doesn't kill us, makes us stronger. But the main question is how should we objectively look at boredom when we are actually bored? This is a more daunting task than actually suffering it. This somehow feels like a massive exercise into our own masochistic ego.

Reflections from Walden Pond

This is more like an after thought than one of my sudden bouts of writing. I had read Thoreau's Walden a few months back which had evoked some difficult issues. Some questions that I have been dying to ask myself, but I didnt have the time to face them. Last night, the family who lives just above my home had a huge fight. The father was practically yelling, no yelling is too small a word, how about this: practically breathing fire down his son's throat - thats more like it - ... down his son's throat to drive him out of his home. There are issues under which this happened, but while trying to drown out that noise I was trying to intently focus on my books and study. I could to a certain extent but later I just got drifted away. 

Every syllable, although incomprehensible evoked a small feeling of derisiveness that, its people and the way they think or perceive reality that drives them crazy and not the circumstances. Lawyers know how to play the circumstance card in the big UNO game of the courtroom - its their wild card. But can all humans play the circumstance card? There is a wonderful mention in this book about how man should never feel self-pity. I dont recall the exact words, but he calls it pretty close to a sin to pity ourselves and our condition. From what I understood is that its not that pitying himself/herself is bad in its own way, its just that we dont want to stand up to our own guilt and accept it - and move on - but rather stand there and think: "why does this always happen to me?"

After all this why do we even bother to worry?

It also led to thoughts of several references to the grinding, grueling effect of the mundane daily existence, which many people, who are creatively inclined (self-diagnosed 'right brain heavy') believe they should get away from. I have noticed so many people shun the idea of day-to-day living for seeking more adventure, blaming the former as a mediocre way to while away our lives. I have begun to wonder, whats not exciting about something so trivial and simple as a mundane life when weekends can be spent in the warm winter sunlight with legs facing north and a book balancing on the tummy? This want for excitement, I believe, also creates a want for belonging to some adventure and not here, not now. Not accepting whats here and appreciating how it got to be that way. There is more materialism (I chose not to use that word, but there are some thoughts that are to be expressed with exact words) in constant thrill seeking than just wanting material happiness through spending more money. This is by no means an excuse for complacency - every adventure has its own time & its own definition for us. 

Thoreau quotes some fellow named Chapman:

"The false society of men - for earthly greatness

All heavenly comforts rarefied to air"

I must admit, this wasnt so obvious at first, but I went back to this line last night to find that there is a constant obsession for some security, although there is no thought given to how to earn this security while having fun at doing so. I also admit, I love the idea of money and what happens to it once it is invested into the right assets for the right (rational) reasons. I also admit, I hate to spend it - doesnt make me a miser in my own eyes (some people do think about me that way) but it surely does allow me to "create" more security for later when I really need it by allocating it wisely right now. Not just allocating it, but having fun while I am at it. I think the sole nature of hating the mundane and the daily stuff of life is only because of the fact that people dont know how to have fun while generating security for themselves. Now Chapman dude feels so correct after thinking through it. There is disheartening realization here that this lack of emotional security while getting more security is turning normal people into savages. I dont think "savages" would suffice, but for clarity it works here.

There is a lack of self-sufficiency. A friend once said to me, that local trains in Mumbai are the classic example of mediocrity - I disputed jokingly that they are the bedrock for opportunity - since we want to get off it as soon as possible so that we could go on with our lives. He refuted. I think there is some merit to what he says that the opportunity that I was talking about also lies in finding a sweet spot inside a crowded train wherein not many people would step on my shoes and I would have that sacred spot to myself. Thoreau says that, " I would rather sit on a pumpkin and have it all to myself than be crowded on a velvet cushion". We put ourselves through all that misery every single morning just to reach where we want to reach to fulfill what we set to do. The idea of homely comfort still beseeches us to find a similar comfort outside our homes. Which makes every single person on the platform including the most mild mannered fellow go wild and slightly aroused as he watches the train approaching. His hands, his feet, his eyes assess complex physical realities to deal with that one ideal flick of his calf and ankle muscles to jump on that train to comfort. What happens when this is multiplied by 100 on just a 6 ft wide door? 

It felt like an hypocrite as I do this every morning, but with less fervor and less risk. I too care for that sweet spot amidst all that testosterone pumped compartment, but I care for my life more to jump on to it. This is my pumpkin it seems. 


Can I do what I love to do, for the rest of my life? Will it make it any more or any less mundane if I choose to do what I love, every single day? I'm still not bored and I don't presume I'd be bored. It then seemed to me like a constant struggle for happiness. This passive hedonism is justified in many ways. Although misery also catches up pretty quickly if there is no choice involved in what course we have to take. I am one of those lucky bastards who does what he enjoys. This also allows me the privilege to filter all thoughts about other activities which I enjoy doing, when I am focused on one. I spoke to many people, who have confessed of being in the wrong jobs, doing something they dont think they want to continue doing - but their reasons were usually material - good hours, good money, "this is my fuck you money", "what else have I got to do?". Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't - it works for some, it doesn't for others.


I found it really worth knowing which category of people I fall into - nothing wrong in being either one of those people - to each his own, I believe.






PS: I also realized as I proof-read this - that I need to add a tad bit more humor on my reading pile sooner than later :)