Most descriptions of the creative process include an insight, which we typically think of as some kind of amazing new fact or observation. There's no doubt that insights are important to creativity, but insights are not just facts, however amazing.
Facts by themselves are not insightful; we're surrounded by noisy, distracting, observable facts at all times. Instead, the insight is an experience which belongs to the perceptive person who picks one out of a million available observations, connects it to a challenge, and sees how important it could be to a creative process.
A recent article pointed out that business people frequently label as "insights" what are really only long lists of observations. The problem is that just describing something is not the same as understanding it. Could Van Gogh have painted one of his famous orchards based on a 500 page research tome about apple production? I think not.
Facts by themselves are not insightful; we're surrounded by noisy, distracting, observable facts at all times. Instead, the insight is an experience which belongs to the perceptive person who picks one out of a million available observations, connects it to a challenge, and sees how important it could be to a creative process. So how do you know when you've had an insight? The personal, inner experience of "aha!". "Aha!" means that you have experienced a revelation; if it's new to you, that's enough. And of course, it could be wrong, so you'll have to evaluate it. But when, amidst the thousands of observations you make every waking hour of your life, you experience an "aha", treasure it. You may be on to something big!
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