Telling stories boosts output, not creativity

When writing, it’s tempting to rely on storytelling to boost output. Storytelling motivates output by providing easy, safe source material. However, that source material is generally anecdotal and often doesn’t provide value for self or others beyond novel entertainment and shallow, if pithy, lessons. Therefore, I should work to recognize when I’m relying on storytelling for inspiration so that I can challenge myself to make my output more adventurously prescriptive rather than lazily descriptive. Also, there’s a difference between perceiving truth within anecdotes vs. faking-serious about experiential understanding.

Perhaps a good way to ensure output is higher-quality is to ensure notes are higher-quality, and a way to ensure notes are higher-quality is to provide safe-spaces for raw ideas to fail. This can be done by actually having a capturing+drafting flow for notes rather than writing notes directly from the brain, unless those notes are purely descriptive.