There are so many different ways to be creative. Dancing, music, poetry, and yes, even software engineering. Even spreadsheets. Even commuting to work. We have to rise above this myth that I’m not creative. It’s not helpful, or healthy. Inside each and every one of you is a unique spark of creativity. Your creativity looks different from mine and that’s not a bad thing, in fact, it’s a fantastic thing.
I named this site Dream. Build. Ship! because I think it captures so much of what I want this site to be. I want it to be a place where I dream and build and ship. And I want it to be a part of the community around me. Hopefully, some parts of this site will inspire others. Hopefully it will start interesting conversations. These 3 words capture what I think are the essential elements of creativity.
Dream.
It starts with a dream, a wish, a desire. A simple acknowledgement that the world is not how you want it to be. A dissatisfaction with the status quo, a hope for the future that could be, and a willingness to be labelled strange, odd, weird, and crazy.
Build.
Dreaming isn’t worth much if it doesn’t materialize. Rising above mediocrity requires work, discipline, persistence, resilience, and stubbornness. There are no shortcuts. Sure, the journey of a thousand miles begins with a thousand steps, but it requires several more.
Ship!
In software and product development we like to use the word ship1, which means to release something to the public. Whatever project you’re working on, at some point it needs to get out there and interact with the world in some way. Otherwise, what is the point? If you made something worth making, then you should place that thing in whatever context that it can be the best that it can be.
Footnotes
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It comes from the days when releasing software meant literally printing it out onto physical floppy disks and shipping it to the stores. ↩