Where Do Ideas Come From?
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Where Do Ideas Come From?
Ben Shewry breaks down his creative process
Words by Ben Shewry
Published 26.08.25
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Everyone has creativity within them. I meet people every week who say to me, “I wish I was more creative”, and right after that they go on to demonstrate some magical creative problem-solving ability. Creativity is not limited to artists. There are no gatekeepers to creativity. But it can be limited by one’s confidence and a lack of recognition of your creative act. The only person who can say that you are not creative is, well, you.
Here I break down a little of the creative process.
My main objective with creativity is to capture ideas as soon as they come to me. I do that by stopping whatever I’m doing, whether that be sleeping, talking, driving, or surfing, and I write it down in Notes under a heading called New Ideas. There is nothing that upsets me more than losing a potentially good idea.
But hold your horses. How do I even have a creative idea in the first place? That part is easy – in part it’s practice, and in part it’s opening yourself up to the world. Go out of your way to have pointless experiences, some silly. Challenge yourself by putting yourself in uncomfortable situations. You’ll find that these experiences influence you in unexpected ways. If you only ever stay in your own environment or industry then your ideas, in my opinion, will be square. Creativity comes from vulnerability.
But how do I know if it’s a good one? You road test it, that’s how. I like to test ideas soon after I have them. I’m just checking out their merit. Nothing fully formed, usually super rough. Just a little “What’s up idea, you any good?”
From here, it’s straight into development. Now at this stage there’s no guarantee that anything is going to come of an idea. You will probably hit a roadblock. But creativity requires a person to go down dead ends. Lots of them. This is the best possible time to collaborate with as many people as possible. Split up the work.
Critique your idea. Just because I have an idea doesn’t mean it’s a good one. Most of my ideas are super cringeworthy. Like the time I decided to make a PowerPoint to win the heart of my now-wife, Kylie. That idea had some serious cringe factor. So yeah, learn to be a tough judge of your ideas. Run them by a trusted friend or even a mentor. Given time, and plenty of failure, you’ll learn to self-edit. Stay on the horse.
Which brings me to new ideas. These are a bit rarer than say, “Hey, today I taught myself a radical new way to tie my shoelaces.” On rarer occasions, if I’m working super hard on creativity, then a new idea might pop up out of the creative process itself. Because it’s a new idea most people might not be on board with it. And they might tell you (sometimes to your face) that your new idea sucks. But if in your heart you know it’s a good one, then you’ve gotta hold on. Be prepared to hang on until the culture or the market catches up.
Then there’s the execution of your creative idea. Unless you are a team of one, you’ll need to be able to document your process in much detail and then teach that to others. Consistency is creativity out in the wild.
The use of creativity and imagination are the answer to many of the world’s problems. And life is more fun when you identify a problem and fix it. Get out there and get after it!
