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Creative Discontent

By Peter Lloyd

I remember proposing to a company that it use “We’re getting better” as its slogan. Or it might have been “We’re getting there.” Doesn’t matter. The idea of not puffing up their corporate chest to its maximum circumference prevented them from broadcasting anything less than a superiority claim. That’s fine, but too bad.

They missed an opportunity to express an ongoing dissatisfaction with the status quo and to embrace an attitude of perpetual improvement, continuous learning, and constant growth. U2 lead singer Bono, when asked to name his favorite song, answered, “We haven’t written it yet.” There’s something disarming, even endearing, about that kind of humility.

Nobody’s perfect and everybody knows it. Well, maybe Mozart was perfect and, okay, Ella Fitzgerald and Groucho Marx. But the rest of us, if we’re honest, find ourselves, our families, friends, communities, nations, and our world lacking. So we identify readily with greats who recognize that they, too, have room to grow.

Creative people possess an abiding discontent. They and their discontent are the force behind progress. Whether it reveals itself as anger or righteous indignation, ridicule or constructive criticism, creative discontent drives change—from rearranging the furniture to igniting a revolution—for better or worse.

Peter Lloyd is co-creator with Stephen Grossman of Animal Crackers, the breakthrough problem-solving tool designed to crack your toughest problems.

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