Bonus Dad Bonus Daughter
Welcome to "Bonus Dad, Bonus Daughter," a heartwarming and insightful podcast celebrating the unique bond between a stepfather Davey, and his stepdaughter Hannah.
Join them as they explore the joys, challenges, and everyday moments that make this relationship special.
Each episode they take a topic and discuss the differences, similarities and the effect each one had one them
Featuring candid conversations, personal stories, and many laughs
Whether you're a step-parent, stepchild, or simply interested in family dynamics, "Bonus Dad, Bonus Daughter" offers a fresh perspective on love, family, and the bonds that unite us.
Bonus Dad Bonus Daughter
Creativity Unleashed: Exploring What's Behind Your Imagination
Send us a Comment, Question or Request, we'd love to hear from you
The episode challenges the misconception that creativity is exclusive to artists. We explore the meaning of creativity and the ways it manifests in daily life. Discover how you can nurture your own creative instincts and draw inspiration from various fields.
• Creativity is not confined to traditional art forms
• The significance of nurturing creativity in everyday life
• Misconceptions surrounding the 'typical' creative person
• The role of personal experience in shaping creativity
• Overcoming creative blocks and self-doubt
• Engaging with creativity as a lifelong journey
Hello and welcome to Bonus Dad. Bonus Daughter a special father-daughter podcast with me Hannah and me, davy, where we discuss our differences, similarities, share a few laughs and stories. Within our ever-changing and complex world, Each week we will discuss a topic from our own point of view and influences throughout the decades or you could choose one by contacting us via email, instagram, facebook or TikTok links in bio.
Speaker 2:Hello and welcome to another episode of Bearnest Dad, bearnest Water.
Speaker 1:All right, Elizabeth.
Speaker 2:I just thought I'd speak Queen's English.
Speaker 1:Yes, very Queen-like.
Speaker 2:Yes, it is. Oh, Philip, I actually kind of miss Lizzie.
Speaker 1:Do you yeah, oh bless, Although do you know what?
Speaker 2:Oh bless, that could not have sounded, less sincere.
Speaker 1:Yeah, do you know? I actually, I'm actually, oh Charles, I am actually warming to him Are you yeah, oh Charlie. Yeah, I'm actually warming to him. I think he's actually doing all right.
Speaker 2:Do you think his friends call him Charles or do you think he's?
Speaker 1:a Charlie? I think he's a Chuck. Do you think he's a charles? I reckon he's a charlie you reckon he's charlie.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, char, char, charles, charles, charles, charlie, charles charles is just a bit pretentious, isn't it?
Speaker 1:I know he's, I know he's the king, but I just feel like charlie yeah, it's probably your majesty yeah, probably is.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I mean, he probably has mates that don't call him your majesty, surely?
Speaker 1:well, I yeah, yeah, do you? Have to insist on it, or like no, I, I think, yeah, I, I suppose. A lot of the time it would be like, oh, your majesty, and he'll go then call me Charles.
Speaker 2:Yeah or Charlie.
Speaker 1:Or Charlie or Chuck.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah, probably not, chuck.
Speaker 2:I can't imagine Camilla calls him your majesty.
Speaker 1:Well.
Speaker 2:Actually, let's not go into that, let's not go into that.
Speaker 1:So with that thought, this particular episode I thought because we would do. We're quite creative people, so I thought we'd do an episode on creativity yeah itself what it is, why it matters how to cultivate it how to?
Speaker 2:I wish I. How do you cultivate it?
Speaker 1:I want to know that. How do you become creative?
Speaker 2:I think you just are. You think it's in your kind of podcast.
Speaker 1:There we go you think it's kind of. Do you know? I think that is. I think creativity is what. Do you think it can be taught? Do you think you can teach people?
Speaker 2:to be creative. That's a strong claim, isn't it because? It's almost an artistic representation, I think you can teach people techniques in the creative world but then would you argue, okay, just a player, would you argue, if you teach.
Speaker 1:I know I know there is an answer to this, but by the fact of being creative.
Speaker 2:It's creating things by yourself and and doing it in a creative way, doing new techniques, doing new things I think if you're pursuing any hobbies in a creative way or pursuing a career of hobbies in a creative way, yeah I think you're already creative I think there are certain things.
Speaker 1:I mean, let's, for instance, like this podcast. Okay, there are techniques to do with the audio. There's techniques to do with what we, how we speak, what we do, which means that you have to do it a certain way for that creativity. But the actual substance is then you, yeah, yeah. So there's a, there's a mixture of the two there and I think I I'm gonna say something quite bold.
Speaker 2:Go on then, say something mildly controversial oh, I love a. When often people think of creative people, they often think I think of. They've got a certain image in their head of a creative person. Okay, go on, they're likely to be dressed boldly, tattooed, maybe have got some sort of uniqueness about them. Maybe they're a part of LGBTQ. They're a part of LGBTQ. Yeah, and the reason I'm going to say that is because I actually think it's because people within that space don't see the black and white.
Speaker 1:It's the grey.
Speaker 2:They see the grey.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:And I think that's why a lot of people, when they think of creative people, they think of bold, imaginative, unique, different. I'm going to go with the word different, because I think that that is because those sort of people don't see. It's not, the world isn't black and white, and I'm going to, I'm going to put myself into that same category.
Speaker 1:I agree.
Speaker 2:Is that you just don't see the world black and white in that sense. I think, that's why people tend to have quite a negative connotation with people of potentially in that space.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:Because they are only in black and white.
Speaker 1:I totally agree with you. I think creative people and I mean I'd like to I put myself in that camp as well, because I do create. You know, there's lots of mediums I've created over the years. I love creating things, but I do, and it's almost like I don't want to make it sound, like I'm not gonna make it sound, but I do think I possibly see the world differently to quite a lot of other people.
Speaker 2:Particularly in your age group, I'd say as well.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:I'm starting to really hate the woke society phrase now.
Speaker 1:Oh yeah, no again. I'm annoyed about it. I think it's.
Speaker 2:Because I would be considered woke. I think yeah, and I think that feels negative.
Speaker 1:Oh, I'm very left wing. I know that I'm very left wing, but I'm, but I'm also. But I also appreciate that other people do have their own perceptions and their own perspectives, and I you're respectful of that I'm respectful of that and I can and I listen to people.
Speaker 2:I I I'm very much I don't necessarily agree with them.
Speaker 1:Exactly that's okay I don't necessarily agree with them, but I will still talk to them, because I will still engage with them, because I'd like to know why they think that way, and I find that interesting. As to what is it that?
Speaker 2:you? Why can't you see the colour?
Speaker 1:Yeah, what is it about that particular say, one particular issue, that is so dead set on something that you know you can't look at it from other people's perspectives? Yeah, and I find that, and that's just how my mind works.
Speaker 2:The need to be right about something and wrong about something. Why can't you actually just think, hmm, I think this about this, but I actually also think this side of it. Maybe I'm on the fence, maybe I think kind of like in between and you're like, I can see it from both sides. Actually, I'm not really sure where I sit, or maybe you do sit on one side, but you're like, but I can respect where you're coming from there or you know.
Speaker 1:Do you know what I think as well? I think, cause I I don't get angry often, but when I do, it's when I know I am completely, 100%, fully informed on the situation and I know what I'm talking about.
Speaker 2:I like to think I'm the same, that I think I'm fully informed on the situation, but I'm not always fully informed on the situation. I think that's another but also.
Speaker 1:But I'm also happy to admit when I'm wrong yes, yeah 100 and I've been wrong many times and someone has said something and I've gone. Actually shit, I've not thought it from that angle. Oh, yeah, you're right. You're right and yeah, I'm happy. Good point. Yeah, but it is, it's about you and you are right about the whole black and white. It's, it's about living in the gray yeah and living in the okay. So what is the whole situation here, rather than just one camp or the other camp?
Speaker 2:And when it comes to defining creativity as well, it's often perceived as being artistic.
Speaker 1:Yes.
Speaker 2:But actually I don't think creativity is just about drawing, painting and writing.
Speaker 1:No, not at all. You're creative in every aspect of your life. I think that's what a creative person is you can be creative about the way that you make a dinner.
Speaker 2:Yeah, you know there are ways of being creative in other areas that may not be the traditional creativity of arts. Yeah, absolutely.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I think, talking actually about food and cooking, that is another artistic form, I think. So you know, you're blending. You're blending flavors together, you're blending smells together to create something new. Yeah, and that is a form of. I mean, your mom's very good at this, she'll. She'll just like start throwing stuff into a pan and then she'll go also, yeah then she'll go.
Speaker 1:Actually, I might add a little bit of this. She did the other night. She did this thing. This, I might add a little bit of this. She did the other night. She did this thing this, because I went a little bit nuts with noodles, nuts with noodles, nuts with noodles. I bought far too many noodles.
Speaker 2:You called noodle at one stage.
Speaker 1:I was yeah.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah, the noodle in the tunes when I was a DJ.
Speaker 2:Is it because you noodled the vinyls? Yes, noodled the vinyls yes, noodles, yes.
Speaker 1:Noodles the verb Noodles yes, so I bought these. I bought lots and lots of noodles, so we're getting through them at the moment, and your mum did this.
Speaker 2:Are these like egg noodles or like yeah, yeah, egg noodles, wait, dried or Dried. That was the problem.
Speaker 1:That was the problem. No, that needs a little bit of this, and it was beautiful when she'd finished.
Speaker 2:Yeah, lovely, she just created it and, looking at the spices and that that we had, she's just throwing it all in a pan and yeah it was like oh actually, because cider is apple anyway and complements the pork, he ended up just finding a recipe that used apple yeah, sorry, that used cider instead and then he was able to create something really nice out of it.
Speaker 1:Now it's become a staple yeah, actually I think mitchell's a really good example here as well, because, because, I wouldn't call him creative no, but in a traditional sense okay, but mitchell as well, and I don't know if he has that, because mitchell works in computers, works in it, yeah very black and white yes, I know, but also it's when you look at computer coding and computing. That's quite a creative world in itself. It's set within parameters of rule and I don't know this for definite mitchell. I mean, I don't want to.
Speaker 2:I mean, mitchell's not a coder, so I'm not sure how much he would be able to offer here, but yeah, I know, but that world is quite creative as well, isn't it? In its own right.
Speaker 1:yes, I suppose it has to stick to parameters.
Speaker 2:It's linear, yeah, but it could be quite creative. There is definitely room for creativity in there yeah but yeah it, it's a rather black and white. It's either the code is going to work or the code is not going to work yeah, but there might be creative way of getting to that code.
Speaker 1:Um, you have to think on your feet and also, I would say there are many ways to get to one yeah, solution yeah so yes, being creative with the solution that you're creating with an it issue, I suppose yeah, I mean, even if you look at the world, of sort of going into the world from mathematics. I mean, mathematics is either true or it's not, it's either right or wrong.
Speaker 2:Yes, we know.
Speaker 1:That is quite black and white. But when you look at, there are a million ways to get to there Exactly, but when you look at things like those people in the past, like the Einsteins of the world, galileo of the world, they're very mathematics, but they also had a very creative mind because they were thinking outside the box.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and then seeing how that fitted in with mathematics or with physics, I think any science sector of that nature is you have to be creative. There has to be some level of huh. We haven't tried that, yeah. Let's try this instead. It's like when Robert Downey Jr gets to the quantum realm thing, but also I mean when he's like change that to a helix, change this to that, and then it was like model complete, 100% effective. And you're like oh no, I've done it.
Speaker 1:Yeah, exactly For time travel.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah, but even like now. I mean, I don't know much about it, but they're talking about these quantum computers.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:I mean that just even messes with my mind how that would work.
Speaker 2:It's yeah.
Speaker 1:It really messes with my mind.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:And to think that you could have a computer that defies the laws of physics. I don't know if I'm saying that right.
Speaker 2:I don't know enough about it, but yeah, there's, there's, very there's. I know what you're trying to say that there is elements that you, or industries that you would probably not label as creative, actually have very creative roots yeah, absolutely that's how they get solutions yeah.
Speaker 1:So I think I think everybody's creative. I mean, look at where we are now as a civilization. We wouldn't have got where we are without there being an element of creativity, and pretty much everybody yeah, it's not reserved for special people.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and I think it's tapping into that and being brave to try something new and looking at just standing back, looking at the problem and think, okay, let's not go down the normal route of how we would solve it, let's do something different, let's try a different way and quite often out of that and mistake. You know, quite often you get something through mistakes yeah, yeah like I said in the previous episode with my photography.
Speaker 1:That was an absolute mistake. What I did. I did not mean to do that, but it came out brilliantly exactly, yeah, yeah so parenting, yeah, oh my god, yeah it's very creative, I think.
Speaker 2:I think parents have to be kind of think on their spot, and particularly as the digital world develops as well they've got to be more creative with how they keep children entertained. And, yeah, keeping children alive, and that's a basic requirement of parenting well, yeah, I know, but I mean, if you think about it in a digital age, like keeping them safe and yeah that side of things as well, like there's creativity there, creativity and teaching, particularly young children.
Speaker 2:Actually, I'm thinking about young children, um, uh, you know we've mentioned, like you know, gardening, community events. You know anything to do with events? Yeah, or creative yeah, I mean.
Speaker 1:So me personally, me personally when thinking about creativity. So I've written stories, written books, written songs, performed songs, creating this podcast with yourself and and, and that, um, photography is very visual, but so I I actually deem myself to be quite a written plays, performed, acted again.
Speaker 2:All of that, it's all creative was a dancer on point as well.
Speaker 1:Um, so you know, that's all that kind of creative art, so that's my kind of creativity yeah but there is this other side to creative, to creativity, as well, and even in a more structured creativity, almost do you know one thing I'm absolutely shit at go on drawing yeah, of all your creative avenues you'd think that I cannot paint, I cannot draw. Yeah, when it comes to drawing pictures, I am shocking, absolutely shocking. I cannot.
Speaker 2:My writing even looks like a doctor's handwriting yeah, your, your hand is terrible it is absolutely shocking whereas I, whereas I can draw enough your mum can draw.
Speaker 1:Yeah, she can draw as well. She's very good.
Speaker 2:I can't do still life, but I can do cartoon quite well, which is just a different art form, I suppose, but it's been a while since I've picked up a paintbrush. I'm more creative in sewing, as well as another, another vein of I haven't got the patience for that oh yeah, so I love it.
Speaker 2:I love altering my clothes and I love making things that fit me well because most clothes don't tailor to my body type anyway, so I end up altering everything. So I've you know, I've definitely developed a bit of a love for doing my own clothes and things like that. Would you class that as creative? Yeah, it means to an end. I don't know it is creative.
Speaker 1:You're creating something, aren't you?
Speaker 2:Maybe the word creative actually doesn't mean what it means.
Speaker 1:It doesn't.
Speaker 2:Maybe it's just an empty word. I think it is?
Speaker 1:Yeah, I think it is.
Speaker 2:The more you kind of think about it.
Speaker 1:I think you know because we, we're constantly creating things, yeah, constantly, you know all developing, creating yeah, yeah, uh, innovating, yeah, I mean, let's say, it isn't just, it isn't just art making better yeah, it isn't just art, I think creativity is just.
Speaker 1:it bleeds into everything, doesn't it? I mean like saying, like science, like we mentioned scientific discovery, I mean even building a business. You are creating something, no matter what that business is you build. I mean your mum again. I'm going to mention her again for the business that she's just recently created, you know, with the stand-up paddle boarding. She's built that from scratch, she's created the logo, she's created I mean you create.
Speaker 2:I mean, I actually created the logo.
Speaker 1:You created the logo and the created. I mean you, I mean I actually created the load. You create the load and the website, but it's born from her idea, creativity yeah, her idea, the whole thing was her idea, and then you've kind of helped her bring it to life yeah yeah, she had the idea and then the two of you have brought it to life.
Speaker 2:So, yeah, I just think she gave me a brief she did, she did and I and I created it from there, but yeah, um, and I and I think it. I think creativity is honestly like the heart of of problem solving, in a sense, because you do often have to find ways, creative ways of going from the basics of wording an email to a client to creating what they their vision and what they're after yeah from a.
Speaker 2:Again, this is probably from an occupational viewpoint but, like you, sometimes you have to be creative in order to solve a problem yeah, an issue, but also, you know, creativity, isn't it?
Speaker 1:you don't just go, you're constantly evolving with creativity as well yes yeah, it is always evolving. It is completely and utterly dynamic. It evolves as you grow, as you experience new things and you learn new things as well. Definitely that creativity changes, definitely. You know in your outlook on life how you see things. Your experiences as well blend into that kind of when you create things. I think so, and I'm talking that as a broad kind of scope.
Speaker 2:I think so and I've started basically a story idea that I had from a dream yeah I started to write down and this was back in lockdown. So this is back in like 2020 before, before I was sick, before any of that, and I and I wrote down this story and I kind of just left it for a while and every every couple of years or so, I pick it back up again same story and I go in and I I remaster it okay, I write it so originally. I wrote it in first person then, I've.
Speaker 2:Then, because I've read a lot more and I've developed a lot more more experience in my life and things like that, I started to write it in third person so I could get another person's perspective on it yeah and then I realized that when I was writing this, I was actually writing this about my own life, but not realizing I was because the event, the original idea, came from a dream and it's masked everything in it, although is not direct excerpts of my life yeah my life influences have influenced the storyline yeah, yeah, yeah and then because I was writing something the other day and I was like, oh shit, I've based this on a real person that I know and that seems not because, not because you know, not for not any in a negative way at all.
Speaker 2:I was just like, oh my god, this is, this is my friend, like I'm writing, yeah, I'm writing my friend's personality in this character. Oh, you do, yeah, because I've grabbed that from my own life and and and then I think this might be the fourth remastered copy of this particular story. Um, but, funnily enough, recently this is the first time I've ever gone past the first book. It was always going to be a trilogy in my head, it always had been, and this is the first time I've ever broached into second book territory.
Speaker 2:Okay, so it it's come along from there and I think, like what you were saying there, like your experiences, absolutely mask and even not mask, sorry, your, your experiences the compliment, compliment and and give homage to, I guess, in your creativeness and your writing. I mean, how many songs have you actually written about your life? Oh my god like there's, there's lots of like little tidbits, everything oh, there is, but I'm very cryptic I know yeah, so am I well I thought I was until I read it and I was like I've written this, yeah, this, this character, and I didn't even mean to yeah.
Speaker 2:It was just that I have someone in my life that this person would fit well in this storyline. And there they are. And I was just like oh fucker, I've based this on so-and-so and I'm like oh, so I mean, there's Karma Boomerang, right.
Speaker 1:So my song Karma Boomerang.
Speaker 1:Oh right off our second EP. So of course we performed that live, I don't know how many times. Then we went into the studio and we recorded it and Benji obviously Benji's bass player, our Benji and of course he never really listens to the lyrics because he's concentrating on the bass and when he actually listened to the song he said to me he went, I know what that song's about and he went, I just got it. He said knowing you, knowing certain aspects about you, he said I know what that song's about. Other people will not know, but.
Speaker 1:I know what that song's about and he said it's genius. But, he said you know how you've written that.
Speaker 2:How big headed of you.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I know your song was genius by the way, but how I'd written it in that kind of cryptic way that if you know me, you know what it's about.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1:But if you didn't know me, it would just sound like, well yeah, so yeah, it's yeah, and I think that's kind of yeah, that kind of creative aspect of that.
Speaker 2:And I guess your creativity is very much developed then, I guess from an early age to.
Speaker 1:I was always writing. I mean, I remember so when I I think.
Speaker 2:I always was you know I've always written. I remember distinctively as a child writing bits like for Harry Potter, which you would now call fan fiction. Yeah, it didn't have a name then, but I I would write stuff and and almost tail off like little different plot lines. I remember writing a lot about, like fred and george, well before before yeah before the battle of hogwarts um killed one of them.
Speaker 2:But um, but yeah, I remember like writing like spin-offs of those and spin-offs of some of the other character, lesser known characters in harry potter, because it was just fun to to do, play around with, because the world was already created by JK Rowling and then I was writing spin-offs of that with her lore, I guess. Yeah, I mean, I did the same with.
Speaker 1:Star Wars. As a child, I'd have all these other stories about Star Wars within that world, and now look what's happening with it. You've got the Mandalorian. You've got all of that and that lore, that world has now got bigger and bigger isn't that kind of interesting that we both did that, even though we're not actually genetically? I think you'd probably be surprised that. How many people do that?
Speaker 2:that's what I mean, like it obviously lends to it that it's not about genetics or it's it's not the biology side. Sometimes it is the um, it's uh, nature nurture, isn't it? Yeah, so so it's how you're nurtured, and I think a lot of people, creative people, probably just took worlds that were already created and made little well, now what we call fan fiction, but it didn't even have a label then. Even when I was younger, I mean.
Speaker 1:But there is a lot of say plagiarism might be the wrong word, say paying homage to certain things. So if you look at star, wars, you know.
Speaker 1:So a lot of stuff, a lot of stuff was taken from june to put into star wars and and again. That that's kind of across the board and I think I've said to said before I think I can't remember there's only nine plot lines in total. Was it seven or is it nine types of plot and then depending on what the world is and the law is and all of that, and you put that in and then create, but the plot line is essentially the same yeah, yeah, I don't think any story is truly unique anymore, because we've got so much media overload of that yeah, um, I think.
Speaker 1:Do you know what I think? When a story is unique, it's born out of real life yes, yeah, something real, that's happened, because it's so left, because this is where I think real, where real life could be stranger than fiction yeah, I mean, how many films have you seen or stories that you heard? And suddenly I said that was a true story and like what, yes, how that actually happened and there's a.
Speaker 2:There's a new film out that's come out recently that I saw at the cinema, which I highly recommend. It's called a real pain. Uh, jesse eisenberg okay yeah and it's got one of the Culkin brothers, kieran. Kieran Culkin yes fantastic movie just follows basically these two cousins who are kind of like brothers who have drifted apart, and then they basically go on a travelling travelling name, but not quite the right word. They travel to basically concentration camps in Poland, I believe, or was it Germany?
Speaker 1:There are some in Poland.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I can't remember now which country they go to.
Speaker 1:I think Auschwitz might even be on the Polish border. I think it is, yeah, I think it is.
Speaker 2:But anyway they travel to a concentration camp and it's all about kind of their Jewish heritage basically it's like leading to that and the things that they do on that trip together. Now, it's not exactly based on a true story like he, that's not, you know that but it is true to a lot of jewish people that they do go, go across and see kind of like the devastation basically, yeah, their ancestors and even people that are still alive today have, you know, experienced that and they're still going on.
Speaker 2:Incredible movie, really good, and there was. There was a couple of bits in it where you laughed, not because it was meant to be funny, but that's just because life is funny and there was just this really random bit that just made us absolutely die. In the cinema where they were going, they were in basically a hotel and the guy says something in the native language of that hotel and the other guy just says something just completely random back that's not the language, it was like Borg or something like that.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:And it just caught you and you just think it was so funny it's timing it's comedic timing. There's a bit where they get high, for example, and they're both in the hotel room watching the hotel promotional channel on TV for like hours and hours, just because they're so high. That's so funny, like in the cinema, and it's just one of those movies that you can see was born from maybe not not a true story, but you can born from the rawness of life yeah, yeah, yeah I highly recommend the movie.
Speaker 2:It's very good. I haven't just ruined the plot. Well, I have ruined the plot, but well, I think it's not a plot type of film yeah, it's just an excerpt of basically two travelers traveling yeah to yeah I mean I think as well.
Speaker 1:I mean it is when you're creative, you are creative out of experience. Yeah, as well. It's. It is your own experiences that you bleed into, like going back to what you're saying about what I was saying about you writing stories about, it's what you write, what you know about and you create what you kind of know and that feeds in and it's hard to write about things that you don't know about, unless you are an absolute genius and make your own languages like like tolkien like tolkien, who seems to have I don't know lived in another world.
Speaker 2:In my opinion, because, he's, the things that he comes out with and languages that he's created is just just. I just think that's, that is an, that is a creative person. Um, that are true and true, and maybe some of us are just like, uh, faking creativity yeah, but being a creative person, do you?
Speaker 1:how do you do your process, do you? Do you think, right, I'm going to sit down, I'm going to do this and I'm going to create something? Or does you? Does it kind of think, oh, I'm not going to do this?
Speaker 2:no, it jumps up on me. I the story that I've been writing since lockdown. Bearing in mind, this is now good five years, I guess in the making. Yeah is I will just get a buzz for it every now and then I'll be like I need to write and then I write solidly for two weeks. Yeah.
Speaker 1:I'm the same.
Speaker 2:Then I don't pick it up again for like five months. Then I'll pick it up again and the same thing with drawing and stuff like that. I get a real bug for it. I do like not a commission, that's the wrong word but I'll do something for someone and then I'm suddenly like drawing again and then I start drawing for ages and then I lose. I lose sort of touch out of that and then I go back to it. I haven't crocheted in years, but there's there's a part of me.
Speaker 2:It's like I could start doing crochet, because I'm making my own clothes. Again and again I've gone back to getting a sewing machine out and altering my clothes again and yeah I don't know. For me it comes and fits and fits and waves, and it's because I've got no timeline or deadlines. That's what makes it fun for me, because I've got no pressure yeah, no pressure there.
Speaker 1:You know that. That's just what I do with my time. Yeah, it's like if I write a story because I'm writing a couple stories at the moment again I've, I've done a couple paragraphs, I've probably not picked it up for a couple of weeks now I might just think oh yeah, just go now, I'll go and write another. Write another paragraph now. With music, quite often we give ourselves deadlines. We're like okay're going to do an EP launch on this date.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1:And we have to write, and we have to do it.
Speaker 2:I think it makes it less fun sometimes it does.
Speaker 1:It does make it then a little bit more like work.
Speaker 2:And you feel like you've got to churn it out and I imagine that's what a lot of authors probably experience is like when's the second book coming?
Speaker 1:out Exactly.
Speaker 2:When's the next way that I like to approach it is that I'm writing all three all in one go yeah and if god, god forbid it ever gets published, because it never, probably would, it doesn't, will, never, probably.
Speaker 2:I know you can, but it would probably never see the light of day, just because I'm not confident enough in my own writing. But it's been a fun thing for me to do and maybe, yeah, maybe, someone has just heard me say that and say, well, that's a bit of a waste of time if you're not gonna do anything with it but, um, it's not been a waste of time, because I've really enjoyed doing it yeah and I'm human and I it's just as much as I mean, I think that is the beauty of the things you enjoy the creative process is the fact that it is a creative process, and I don't think you can force it.
Speaker 1:Now I read somewhere I don't know this is true, it might be true, but eminem okay, that apparently eminem will work nine to five in the studio, that's it. He'll go in at nine and he'll finish at five, no matter what he's doing. He's like no, that's when I'm working, that's when I'm not working. Very kind of rigid and I respect that.
Speaker 1:I do respect nice work-life balance exactly but I know myself like I could think right I'm, I'm going to do that, and then I'm writing a song, and then I'm still going three o'clock in the morning.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:You know, because I'm thinking no.
Speaker 2:Maybe it's because you don't see music in the same way as Eminem. Eminem's job is music. Your job isn't music at this stage in your life. Like you've got another job.
Speaker 2:I'm too old for that now I personally I don't think you are, by the way I don't think that I see writing as work. I see it as a fun hobby to do. So yes, I will go into the earlier hours in the morning to do it, because I don't see it as work. Eminem, who produces music, who writes music it is his career is obviously going to see it as work because that is his nine to five but again, that's when you get to the argument of like creativity.
Speaker 1:Where does creativity become a work? And a chore exactly because you're having to do it for something rather than for the sake of being creative, because of deadlines, and those deadlines could be set through through, like, yeah, publishing companies, through record companies, or or even, you know, even going back to the cooking side of things, restaurants.
Speaker 1:You know you've got to get a new menu out in, so and so, so you need to create this within two weeks and you're on a deadline and you're forcing. You got to then force that creativity, that creative process maybe, maybe work reduces creativity.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think it does. Maybe structure is not how creativity flourishes, yeah, as much. But that's not the case for Eminem. So who knows what?
Speaker 1:about? Do you ever get frustrated with yourself because you sometimes, like I don't know, say like when you're writing?
Speaker 2:Mental block. Yeah, yes, oh, my God. And then you get yourself so caught up in your own head I also think that's why I stopped for months on end, because I just get so annoyed at myself and then, and then when I come back to it, I'm like, oh yeah yeah it's interesting and and I mean there's there's probably another debate for this for chat gpt and stuff like that but sometimes I actually find those tools quite helpful, not for the writing of it, let me, let me, let me finish.
Speaker 2:Not for the writing, but say me, and you were bouncing ideas off each other. Yeah, I don't see that any different than using chat gpt no, I'll agree with.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:Bouncing ideas yes, I'll agree with you sometimes I'm like, look, I want to get to this particular plot point. That plot point has been organically produced in my brain, in my head, but sometimes I don't always know how to get there right. So I'll ask chat gpt.
Speaker 2:I'll be like hi, I want to get from this bit hi, I'm always quite pleasant because I feel like if the robot does take over this world, I want it to remember my politeness and not, you know, not ban me with everyone else. Hi, hi, chat, and I always put thank you as well at the end. I know it's really stupid and I I know it's not a real person, but it feels like a real person sometimes and I'm like right, I am at this point. I would like to get to this point. What you know, have you got any ideas? I want to include this, this, this and this, and then it will come up with maybe five suggestions.
Speaker 2:Sometimes they're all pretty shit yeah but sometimes I'll be like, oh, I like number two and aspects of number four, is there something? We can find some middle ground and it might come up with something. And then the ideas that produces will make you think of something else and you're like, oh, I can see where this is going. Like I can see it coming from there. Yeah, I don't think that's any different to talking to a friend about it. No, but it takes away the embarrassment of oh, my god, I'm writing something and I feel quite passionate about it, but I'm not willing to share it yet.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, yeah, no, I yeah okay, I can see where you come from it never writes anything of mine, but it helps definitely cultivate some ideas okay, so this is where we could I mean this won't go back to the black and white and the gray. This is where you're kind of firmly in the gray now. I started this where I'm very when it comes to creating and writing. I'm very anti-chat gpt.
Speaker 2:Yeah yeah, yeah because I think that you know, as am I, to be honest, because I did ask it once.
Speaker 1:Just I just tried it. I said write me a scar song yeah four, four scar song with a verse, a pre-chorus a, and throw a bridge in there as well.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:And instantly it churned out and I read it and I thought it rhymes, the cadence is right, but there is absolutely no feeling and no soul in this, in what has been written. Yeah, absolutely none whatsoever and it wouldn't, because it's not a human because it's not a human, and that's why I think the difference is it's the it's, especially when it comes someone specifically about writing and songwriting. Yeah, it is that aspect of it which is to me, which is what is being created.
Speaker 2:Songs are quite short media but when you look at like a whole novel yeah sometimes it's nice to be able to bounce the ideas to get from one point to another. That's the difference, isn't it? You've got a song is a short excerpt of words. A novel is a long piece and sometimes it can help you get there, but of course it's brought all that ska song knowledge from other ska songs.
Speaker 2:It's pulled all of its data in its Scar head and it's gone. Ah, okay, so it's probably got like real big fish lyrics. It's got like it's got Less Than Jake is that the name?
Speaker 1:Yeah, goldfinger, yeah, exactly.
Speaker 2:Maybe even hints of the specials, yeah, the madness, yeah, yeah, and it's probably pulled bits that. Oh okay, all of the songs follow this particular theme, so I'm going to produce a very generic song that has all of those themes in it. Yeah, and it would probably be successful to be honest with you. Well, this is yeah, yeah, you know, because it is pulling in all of the successful themes of other media in that space.
Speaker 1:Because with a song, you have to say a lot in one sentence. That's why words matter and it's got to rhyme. Well, not got to rhyme, but you know you've got to say a lot. Same with short stories. Yeah, with short stories, every single sentence matters, and you're right because, it's short and you know when you're describing things and it needs to be. You know quite every single sentence absolutely matters. Novels not so much no, because it still does, but not so much.
Speaker 2:Because novels have more room to build the creative storyline and the creativity there.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:But yeah, I you know, I know we're talking about individual creativity, but there is some creativity in seeking out ideas from maybe illegitimate sources in the sense of you know, I think there is room for that.
Speaker 2:illegitimate sources in the sense of you know, I think there is room for that and I think it's nice to bounce ideas off something that may produce something that comes back and you get ideas from it and I can't really see anything wrong with that personally. But I don't get it to write, obviously, excerpts of the actual novel. That's all me.
Speaker 1:Do you ever get like imposter syndrome All the time? Yeah, when you're creating things.
Speaker 2:Well with creative things, but just I think, generally in my life I feel like I'm an imposter in my own body all the time. But yeah, definitely with creative things. I wouldn't really label myself as someone that can. I have a lot of skills, but I'm not an expert in any of those skills. I'm not good at any of those things. Do you know what?
Speaker 1:I think sometimes that's what makes a good creative person is that they're not expert and they're not bound by those rules, yeah, the conformity. Yeah, and I think that sometimes that is what makes a creative person, not you know that makes them more creative because they're not aware of you know. Again, it's almost that argument. I'm just spurting out rubbish now I think, but like the whole, ignorant is bliss, because the more that you know and the more that you have knowledge about something, the more you realize you don't know, yeah, uh, and.
Speaker 2:But you know with, with creativity, you're not bound by those rules, you're creating something I know, and I and I think you know, our closing thoughts on that really for our listeners, is that you know you should embrace your creativity in your own way and you don't have to be an expert in anything to to be creative. If you have a story in your head but you're not a writer, write it down anyway yeah, yeah you know, write it down anyway, find someone that can write it.
Speaker 2:If you want to, yeah, maybe jump on chat gpt and run some ideas by it. There's nothing stopping you, you know. Uh, there will be people in the swell that tell you, don't use chat gpt for this thing and that thing and that thing. And you know, and maybe they're right, maybe they are right, like it's fine. But you know, don't close yourself off just because someone says you can't use certain things or you can't do certain things.
Speaker 1:The whole point of being creative. Yeah, use all the tools that you've got.
Speaker 2:Oh, you can't play an instrument. Yeah, you can still write a song.
Speaker 1:But also it doesn't need to make sense. No, it's when you create something, mm-hmm, and I'm kind of. I know we're going to come towards the end of the episode here, but there's one piece of creative media that I absolutely love, because it makes no sense, because we've said this before in the fact that we've both got we haven't got in it, me and you haven't got any monologues no now. I've asked this question quite a lot, since we mentioned this a lot of people have asked me about this as well everybody has asked, everyone I've spoken to.
Speaker 1:They all have in the monologues yeah and I said well, how do you see things visually?
Speaker 2:I see pictures, I see visual things the question I always get is how do you read? Yeah, so visual. I just don't hear the words in my head and I don't know how to. It's the same thing with sign language.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:If I just don't, as a deaf person or partially deaf person, doesn't hear the words in their head, they can see it visually.
Speaker 1:I would say that's the exact same scenario for reading yeah, no, I agree. Yeah, no, I agree.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I agree, yeah, I think you can end on your poem to be honest.
Speaker 1:Yeah, well, it's not my poem. Well, no, it's not your poem.
Speaker 2:But you can end on that and we'll finish the episode after you've read your yeah, I think these and leave our listeners on that.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I think when you talk about visual and creativity and things that don't make sense, but they kind of do, these are called backwards poems or nonce or nonsensical poems. Yeah, and there's two, and the first one is quite creepy when you think about it. So I'm going to read it out, and it says yesterday, upon the stair, I met a man who wasn't there. He wasn't there again today. I wish that man would go away. When I came home last night at three the man was waiting there for me, but when I looked around the hall I couldn't see him there at all. So it's a contradictory backwards poem. So it makes no sense, but when you actually listen it's quite creepy, isn't it?
Speaker 1:it makes me think of ghosts yeah, it does make you think of supernatural things yeah but actually it's probably a reflection of the self because your mind is trying to make sense of a nonsensical poem yeah, yeah, yeah yeah, but my favorite oh, I like this one too is.
Speaker 1:Yeah. One bright day, in the middle of the night, two dead boys got up to fight back to back. They faced each other, drew their swords and shot each other. The deaf policeman heard the noise, came and shot the two dead boys. And if you don't believe this lie is true, ask the blind man. He saw it too Cue the outro.
Speaker 2:Thanks for joining us on Bonus Dad, bonus Daughter. Don't forget to follow us on all our socials and share the podcast with someone who'd love it. We are available on all streaming platforms. See you next time, bye-bye you.