A Note On Creator Mode

You look at the world. Closely. Then very closely. You think. You feel. Something doesn’t look the way it should be. Or the way you want it to be. You see something different, something better, something more beautiful—or just something you want but can’t justify why. You just want it that way. It’s not about better or worse, right or wrong. It’s about taste. Your taste. How you want—or wish—things to be.

Then comes the itch. Why shouldn’t it be the way I want it? Why should it be any other way? Who decided? Why? After all, everything is random—everything is meaningless. Any act of creation is an act of giving order to a universe that craves disorder.

So, you infuse life into your imagination. If it can be anything, why not your thing? And once you have conviction in your vision, you can’t help yourself anymore. You have to bring it to life. Because you want to live in the world you see inside your head. It has to exist. It must.

But how? Is it even possible? Is it worth it? How does anyone know?

At that point, you have a choice: what to do? Keep thinking about its utility? Or your ability? Or its practicality? Or leave the paralysis behind and just try to create?

You’ll be fine either way. The brain is a master storyteller—it’s easy to make peace with any story. You can let go of your imagined version and settle for the story of constrained reality. You won’t know what could have been. You can’t know whether you missed out or were better off not creating. All it takes to not create is a pinch of cynicism, a dash of hopelessness, and zero romanticism.

I don’t have those. I’m not a cynic. I have a dwindling relationship with hope, but, at the moment—for reasons that demand deeper social investigation—I am full of it right now. And I’ve always been a romantic, high on life despite all its known delusions.

And so, I am creating. I am living the only life I can imagine—a life of creation. In the last few months, everything has aligned to put me in peak creator mode. It’s different than anything that came before. In ambition, in imagination, in doing.

I feel it in my work, in the ideas that wake me at night, in conversations that spark new possibilities. Every neuron seems to fire in sync. Every experience feels like fuel for creation.

Will this state last? Or is it just a phase? Will I keep going when the going gets harder? Or will I change my story?

I don’t know. I can’t know. And I don’t want to. Because now isn’t the time to think. It’s time to do.

As I write this, I’m thinking of the first time I heard this Steve Jobs speech. I was in my hostel room, and his words hit me like lightning:

When you grow up you tend to get told the world is the way it is and your life is just to live your life inside the world. Try not to bash into the walls too much. Try to have a nice family, have fun, save a little money. That’s a very limited life.

Life can be much broader once you discover one simple fact: Everything around you that you call life was made up by people that were no smarter than you. And you can change it, you can influence it, you can build your own things that other people can use. Once you learn that, you’ll never be the same again.

Jobs was right. That moment changed me forever. (I swear, I’m not exaggerating.) And now, years later, I understand why.

This is what creator mode feels like—when nothing seems off-limits. There are no rules. Only possibilities. Infinite. The unknown is not a void; it’s a canvas.

This journey can feel lonely—it often is. And it’s loaded with doubt. But when you read about the greatest creators, you realise something uncanny: they all say the same thing. Creation is a struggle—a battle between vision and ability, ambition and reality, taste and talent. The gap can seem impossible to close. But it’s this very gap that pulls you forward.

So none of my struggles are unique; there’s no point in romanticising or resenting them.

All the greats say the same: show up every day—do more, say less, and relentlessly bridge the gap between intent and action. That’s really it.

Because you can’t predict the arc you will follow. You just can’t. All you can have is belief that the act of doing will lead somewhere. Where? You won’t know. But that uncertainty is part of the thrill.

Somewhere, possibly, towards how you wanted things to be. And so, in a way, creation is about hope.

Actually, no. Wait. I think creation is about love. I really mean it.

This is the point where I’m reminded of that epic speech on love by the incomparable Andrew Scott—you know, the Hot Priest from Fleabag? Read it, but brace yourself:

Love is awful. It’s awful. It’s painful. It’s frightening. It makes you doubt yourself, judge yourself, distance yourself from the other people in your life. It makes you selfish. It makes you creepy, makes you obsessed with your hair, makes you cruel, makes you say and do things you never thought you would do.

It’s all any of us want, and it’s hell when we get there. So no wonder it’s something we don’t want to do on our own.

I was taught if we’re born with love then life is about choosing the right place to put it. People talk about that a lot, feeling right, when it feels right it’s easy.

But I’m not sure that’s true. It takes strength to know what’s right. And love isn’t something that weak people do. Being a romantic takes a hell of a lot of hope.

I think what they mean is, when you find somebody that you love, it feels like hope.”

Now, read that again—but replace every “love” with “creation.”

Go on, do it, I’ll wait.

…

Did you feel it? If not, go create.

Because I am. And oh, my dear reader, how freaking beautiful is that?