NOTES ON CREATIVE IDENTITY
Someone says something, and the room nods and agrees, moving on before the idea’s even been properly considered.
I used to think that nodding meant everyone else had already understood, and I hadn’t caught up yet. I’ve since come to think the opposite is at least as often true. Nodding quickly isn’t evidence of understanding. It’s evidence of social fluency, the practised ability to look like you’ve grasped something the instant it’s said.
Some people really are fast processors. But a lot of quick agreement has little to do with speed and everything to do with the discomfort of being the one still working something out while everyone else has moved on. Nodding protects the nodder from that exposure. It rarely tells you whether the idea landed.
Nodding quickly isn't evidence of understanding.
Often the idea isn’t even clear to begin with. The person presenting it is circling, talking around the edges of something they haven’t quite finished forming. Putting an idea that’s still only pictured in someone’s mind into words is a genuinely tricky endeavour, and it rarely comes out fully formed on the first attempt. More than once I’ve sat there pulling the exact face of a confused Sharpei, while everyone around the table had apparently already filed it under understood.
When a room agrees before anyone’s actually understood something, the idea gets built on a foundation nobody checked. Nobody asked the question that would have exposed the gap. The work moves forward anyway, and whatever was unclear at the start stays unclear, just buried a little deeper under everyone’s agreement. The difference tends to surface eventually, usually at a worse moment than the one where it could have been asked about cheaply.
For some of us, being the one still working through the unclear thing carries an extra cost that has nothing to do with the room. It can tip fast into wondering what’s wrong with you, when really, nothing was wrong with you. The thing itself just wasn’t clear yet.
Nobody asked the question that would have exposed the gap.
There’s a version of this that doesn’t even require anyone to say anything. You can feel the judgement before there’s any evidence it’s real. Nobody’s smirking. Nobody’s said you’re slow. But some part of you is certain the room has already decided, and you’re waiting to be caught out. That imagined version can cost as much as the real one, and it’s far more common than people admit.
What I’ve come to trust instead is this. Needing more time than the room is offering isn’t a deficit. It’s an honest relationship with not pretending. You didn’t nod along, not because you missed something, but because you needed the time it takes to process and unravel what you’d heard. That can make you feel like the odd one out, like you’re slow, like you didn’t get the joke. But you just wouldn’t call something understood before it actually was.
The thing itself just wasn't clear yet.
Your own pace, trusted, is not the same thing as being behind. It might be the only part of the whole exchange that was actually telling the truth.
A small invitation
Think of the last room you sat in where you didn't nod right away. Instead of filing it as evidence you were behind, ask a different question. Was the thing actually clear? Or did you just need more time with it than the room was willing to give?
Notes on Creative Identity is a weekly reflection on creative work, creative practice and what it takes to remain connected to the person inside the work.
Parish Stapleton
Creativity Coach, artist and writer