What’s YOUR letter “E”?
You know, the thing that shows up so much in what you do or what you use that you don’t even realize how much it’s there?
Like in the above sentence, for example. The letter “E” shows up eight times in that sentence. Heck, it shows up practically everywhere! It’s hard to write a sentence WITHOUT using the letter “E.” Right?
Enter Andrew Huang. He’s got a video trending right now that has him rapping for over two and a half minutes… without using the letter “E” in anything he says. (Unlike that last sentence, which had 10 uses of the “fifth stiff glyph”… as Andrew would say.)
Now, you have to get pretty darn creative with your use of language to avoid using the letter “E” in all of your sentences for a rap like that. (Fifteen “E”s there.)
But that got me thinking: How could eliminating a common element of ones own medium get us thinking in more creative ways?
What’s possible when we take a thing we take for granted… off the table?
This question’s got me curious to hit the studio and find out. And for me… my “E” is color. LOTS of color.
So what’s possible when I take a tool I take for granted out of my tool-kit? What could that do to up or change my game?
Heck, what could it do to YOURS?
What’s YOUR letter “E”? And what could be possible were you to create without it?
Share your thoughts and ideas in the comments below, okay?
I cannot wait to see what you draw forth,
An interesting idea, Jeannel. Will have to give this some thought. I would have said using color too (but, you seem to have that one taken….so, I’ll give it some more thought). To take away something you use a lot does seem as though it would spur creativity.
I will have to ponder a bit to figure out what my “E” is!
This reminds me of a game I played with one of my client groups recently. (I do not remember where I got it, Gamestorming maybe?) I call it You Can’t Think Outside the Box Until You Know What Box You’re In.
I held up a brick and asked folks to quickly brainstorm a list of all the things they could do with the brick. Then I asked them to look through their list and find one thing that all their ideas had in common. In one small group, all their ideas involved building something. In another, they all involved violence. (Interestingly, the first group was mostly men and the second mostly women!)
That one thing they had in common – THAT’S their current box! Now repeat brainstorming, but coming up with ways to use that brick that do NOT involve either building or assault. Rinse, lather, repeat.