Yesterday I had a kid come up to me and say he was going to quit yoyoing. “Why?” “I’ve been working for days making this new trick and I found it today on youtube.”
This is one type of creativity gremlin, a little monster that defeats the creative spirit and robs the creator of the satisfaction that comes from the creative process. I explained to the young yoyoer that he still had created something special and he still had ownership of it. Certainly someone had basically created the trick prior to him but he had still had expressed himself and created something worthy of his efforts.
Many of us have created tricks or moves only to discover them being used in videos or even taught in tutorials. That shouldn’t detract from the satisfaction of having created the same thing.
This is just one type of gremlin when it comes to creativity. Let’s identify those little buggers in this thread and cage them up!
If at some point I come up with a trick that I think is original and then someone points out “hey, I saw this on youtube, it’s the same thing”, then I’ll be a bit disappointed, but I’ll move on.
For me, it’s all about having fun. Making up new tricks isn’t something I am really going to focus on. If I can assembly various elements into some sort of coherent combo that I feel is enjoyable, that’s good enough for me.
This happens to everyone. I remember I made up a Green Triangle and put it on youtube right away. Two Years Later, I saw Eric Koloski use something similar to it and I thought “He stole my trick!” I got over it eventually, but I was worried that people are going to say that I stole the trick from him when I perform it.
Anyhoo, moral of the story: It’s not about the trick, but the execution that makes it unique.
Actually, last night I uncovered that my little ‘whip trapeze’ was actually a laceration. Bummed, no way. Instead, I was happy that I learned a trick/figured out a trick without even looking at a tutorial. When it came time for me to look up Laceration, I found that it was my so-called Whip Trapeze. Well, that’s 1 less trick to have to learn on YYE’s advanced list!
I have a simple solution for that one. If it’s a trick I feel I made up then I’ll give it a name, and if I then find out that somebody else has already done the same trick then I simply ask myself if my name for it is better, and whomsoever has the bestest name wins.
It’s just a good thing I’m awesome at coming up with yoyo trick names.
yoyo tricks are an art… how many paintings out there are of mountains or faces or wildlife… thousands, millions, billions maybe more… and they keep comming… how many kids have ever made school busses or airplanes or skyscrapers out of legos… art is an outward manifestation of inner being…
