The Thing Itself:

The Psychology of Creativity

From film-makers to poets, musicians to photographers, theatre-makers to illustrators, doctors to CEOs, I love exploring what creativity means to people from all walks of life, from those making art to those using innovative decision making in domains not traditionally considered ‘creative’. I want to know how people access their creativity, where they get ideas, how people make art and why they keep making it. We’ll talk about what drives creative people to keep going, how they overcome internal and external obstacles, how they balance creativity with making an income, and what their creative work means to them.

The Thing Itself explores the

Psychology of Creativity

I’m starting a podcast where I interview people like yourself about their creative process, what keeps them going, why they do what they do, how they get ideas and how they turn those ideas into reality. We’ll explore their juiciest sources of inspiration and motivation, their most important creative relationships, and what drives them through periods of setbacks and discouragement.

What’s the story of the podcast? Coming from a very musical family, creativity has been around me from a young age, but it wasn’t until trying to make a career as a professional musician that I began to understand how much thought, wisdom and hustle goes into building the necessary scaffolding to surround a creative life. It’s not enough just to have ideas - there is so much important psychology surrounding the maintenance of a productive creative process. How does one identify which ideas to put effort into, and which to discard? How do you know when to listen to critical feedback, and when to brush it off? How do you balance your own creative drives with the imperatives to make money and market your work? Every creative person has faced these questions and more, but I found that many people don’t really talk about them, instead assuming that the creative process is something that comes ‘naturally’ to others, whilst we struggle in silence.

As a mindfulness teacher in training at the University of Bangor, I’ve also gotten interested in psychology and neuroscience of mindfulness and how this links to creativity. The synthesis of new ideas into something original is inherently a mindful process, one that requires a deep connection to the immediacy of one’s present experience - but creatvitiy also involves imagination, which takes us away from what’s happening now. Many well known creatives have been heavily influenced by different types of meditation, and I’m curious to explore how mindful principles of non-judgement, acceptance and openness to present-moment experience show up in creative peoples’ processes, even without them realising it.

Finally, my background in computer science and machine learning has made me interested in the most human elements of creativity, and what we mean when we use the word ‘creative’. With the increasing accessibility of creative artificial intelligence, I’m fascinated to ask people what they think the place of human creativity is in a rapidly changing world.

 FAQs

  • In case you don’t know me, my name is Lilly and I’m an independent musician, music producer, creative entrepreneur and mindfulness teacher. I run a series of gatherings called Scratch Nights, where creators from different disciplines share in-progress work and give feedback and encouragement. These events gave me the idea for this podcast, where I plan to interview emerging creatives and give audiences an insight into their amazing imaginative worlds.

  • Each episode is between 30 and 45 minutes long and the recording itself will take between 60 and 75 minutes. If I don’t know you very well yet, I’ll suggest we schedule a quick call or coffee meeting before the recording so that we can get to know each other better and explore what we will talk about.

  • I plan to record all episodes of According To Me from my home studio in South-East London (accessible by public transport on train lines from Whitechapel, Victoria, Clapham Junction, London Bridge and Farringdon). This is so that we can get the best possible audio quality and so that we can capture the intangible magic that comes from feeding off each other during an in-person conversation. It also gives me a chance to feed you with my famous gluten-free bakes, if so desired ;) If it is absolutely not an option for you to make it in-person to London, we might be able to work out a way to record the podcast remotely.

  • Unfortunately right now the podcast doesn’t make any money, so I can’t pay you for participating. If that stops you participating I’m really sorry – hopefully one day I will be able to afford a guest fee!

  • I will be promoting the podcast through my social media channels, at live events that I run and also using some paid advertising. When your episode is published, I will suggest collaborating on joint social media posts in order to spread the word. I also plan to upload the episodes to a specific YouTube channel.

  • I expect that the initial audience for the podcast will be made up of other emerging creatives and people who support the arts. It is likely to be mostly people between the ages of 25-40 since that is the major existing audience demographic for my music and events, and this audience is mostly based in the UK and other parts of Northern Europe. I am aiming to achieve an initial audience of between 100 and 200 listens per podcast episode.

  • No! It might help to think about any current projects that you are working on and would like to promote. In addition, if you have extracts from a current project with audio that could be played during the podcast (e.g. music, readings from poems or prose, audio from recent film work, audio from events), I would love to include those.

  • I will ask you questions about what you’re working on currently, about your creative process in general, about where you get ideas and how you turn those ideas into reality. I’ll probably dig into what keeps you going and how you stay motivated, and I might ask you about how you make money from your work or balance other employment with creativity. But don’t worry – we’ll have a chat before I start recording about what we will roughly talk about and I’ll check in with you if there are any things you would rather I didn’t ask.

  • Yes! I will send you the final edit and you will have a week to listen to it and ask for any parts to be removed.

  • This can be negotiated between us. The first six episodes of The Thing Itself will be published in the first half of 2025. If you have a specific date when you’d like your episode to be released (e.g. in order to promote an event) please let me know and we can co-ordinate.

  • Absolutely! That’s sort of the point!

  • I don't mean to be rude, but... you probably are!! I'm interested in interviewing people from all walks of life about their creativity - their imagination, how they get and execute ideas, how they make disparate connections between things and how they use creativity to optimise or improve decision making or relationships at work and in their lives more broadly. Whilst a lot of the interviewees on The Thing Itself will be working in the "creative industries", I firmly believe some of the most "creative" people are not necessarily artistic. I'm fascinated to understand how creativity shows up in different domains, such as business or medicine, that are not traditionally considered to be creative. Basically - If I've asked you to be on the podcast, it's because I'm sure you've got something interesting to say about creativity :)