Choosing a Path

“Would you tell me, please, which way I ought to go from here?”
“That depends a good deal on where you want to get to,” said the Cat.
“I don’t much care where—” said Alice.
“Then it doesn’t matter which way you go,” said the Cat.

Alive in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll

Choosing a path tends to be a problem with creators. Society has taught us to zero in on one craft from an early age and to dedicate ourselves to mastering it. But what if that’s the wrong way to approach it? David Epstein shares a different approach:

“The more contexts in which something is learned, the more the learner creates abstract models, and the less they rely on any particular example. Learners become better at applying their knowledge to a situation they’ve never seen before, which is the essence of creativity.”

Range by David Epstein

Maybe choosing a path is not choosing graphic design or videography or any other skill. Maybe the path is creativity. So if the goal is creativity, we have permission to choose all crafts. Because the more we learn, the more creative we can be. There is no such thing as useless knowledge or skills. It all works together to build connections that allow us to create.