Todd Henry of Accidental Creative defines it as “creating anything that we aren’t required to create.”

Unnecessary Creating is what you did when you were a kid, when you just made stuff for fun.  No one paid you to make it, or expected it to turn out a certain way.  You just did it for the joy of creating something.

If you loved what you were doing enough, then you grew up and became a professional at it.  And then, maybe, you stopped creating stuff just for the fun of it.  That’s when you stagnate.

Unnecessary Creating is like exercise.  You can’t run a marathon without training.  Art is no different.

what I consider to be Unnecessary Creating

• Writing music – This makes up most of my unnecessary creating time, whether it’s solitary writing time or collaborating (co-writing) with friends.
• Writing – As in words.  Getting ideas down on paper.
• Drawing, Painting, Sculpting – I do these things less often, unfortunately.  Visual art has always been on the back-burner for me, and I have so much respect for people like Julie Fader who are able to excel at both music and visual art.
• Photography – This is what Ali does in her unnecessary creating time.
• Making videos – When I was around 10 yrs old, all I did was make videos.  The video camera was my favourite creative tool.  Lately, I’ve been editing home videos from my childhood – definitely an unnecessary endeavor that I get a lot out of.

what I don’t consider to be Unnecessary Creating

• Practicing – Although it’s a similar activity in that it’s unnecessary (you don’t have to practice), it’s not really about creating or making things.
• Preparing for gigs -  This is the bulk of the work I do day to day.  And it’s completely necessary…and not very creative.
• Writing music that I’m being paid to write – If I’m commissioned to write something, then it’s absolutely necessary to get it done.  It gets lumped into the daily workload along with learning tunes and rehearsing parts.

Eventually, some of the projects that are born out of unnecessary creating time become necessary projects. That’s a good thing.  The trick is to keep developing new projects all the time, to always have something to play with.

300 unnecessarily creative hours

I set a goal at the beginning of the year to spend 300 hrs in 2010 creating unnecessarily.

Since it’s now officially the end of the first quarter, I checked in to see if I’m on track.

I’ve logged 45hrs so far.  That’s not bad, but at this rate, I won’t reach 300 hrs by the end of the year.

Tim Burton’s “unrealized projects”

A few weeks ago, Ali and I checked out the Tim Burton exhibit at the MOMA.  We were so inspired by his work.  The exhibit is a goldmine of unnecessary creativity.  All the sketches, paintings, scripts, videos – the ideas that never saw the light of day.  Check out this list of Burton’s projects, presented chronologically, including ones that were unfinished…

(click to read that fine print)

Also – read Seth Godin’s post about this same list.

Do you make time for Unnecessary Creating in your life?

(photos by Ali Eisner)

p.s. Check out Accidental Creative if you’re interested in this whole Unnecessary Creating thing.