The Need to Be Original (essay)

By Luke Labern

The Need to Be Original
By Luke Labern

The aim of this short essay is simply to inspire thought and, perhaps, action.

I

I am currently sitting in a car on a motorway and have decided that rather than spend it in silence looking at the countryside whizzing past, I would write this. This leads directly into my point: the need to be original. My definition of the word ‘original’ is different, depending on the context in which I am using it and what I’m arguing for. At this moment, however, I am thinking of originality as akin to vitality and creativity. I need to, much as this essay is attempting to, provoke thought. To shift the emphasis away from the past and to place, with force, the need for right now to matter. So what if you are not Shakespeare, Mozart, or any genius associated in your field? Even if you are the genius of your profession, you may not know it. It is imperative to have faith both in your abilities (no matter how limited they are) and in your realisation that if the world is going to continue, we must ignore the fact that these people ever lived. I mean this in a nuanced way: of course I do not mean we must forget Shakespeare, but rather we must not let him torture us with his brilliance. Just because he has written Hamlet does not stop you from writing your novel, your play, your poem, your work of art. This is a message not only to artists, however: it is to quite literally everyone.

Creativity and inspiration are not reserved to artists. In every conversation there is need for lucidity and originality. In almost every circumstance you can find yourself in where you have any chance to act freely, there is the chance to affect the world positively and creatively. Every person is individual, as anyone will tell you: and I am not writing this from some misplaced sense of Americanised therapeutic optimism. I am simply stating the fact that every person who can be described accurately through the use of a cliché is failing as a human being. There is within every single person at least one spark of originality, something unique to them which has never before been seen in the whole of humanity. It is your job as a human, I argue, to identify these sparks of originality and to cultivate them. The benefits will give your friends a more interesting life and a sense of pride in knowing you, your parents a source of pride to have given birth to such a ‘wonderful specimen’ and, most persuasively of all, to you.

What will originality bring to you? Perhaps power. Perhaps fame. Perhaps wealth. Even if it doesn’t, however, you will have something to be proud of: a real personality. A depth. A complexity, a secret, a charm – if nothing else, a purpose. I could expand on this, but I really do not think I need to: those who have any sense of pride (or in any way value themselves as vehicles for self-improvement) will have already been persuaded.

There are an endless sea of people who will tell you that you will fail. They will tell you that there is no point in even trying: you will not succeed or change the world. They will tell you that you should ignore you aspirations, bury them and get on with a ‘real job’. Their definition of real is very different to mine, and I dare say most people’s. The reason these people say these things is because either they are jealous of your ambition, or because they once had it, failed, and didn’t have the heart to try again – their ego was wounded irreversibly. But they are not like you and I, are they? We will continue regardless. Failure does not scare us. The only thing that scares us is not trying. You and I would rather aspire to be original and fail than to have never tried at all, to have spent all of our time and effort on fitting in. No, you and I, we value originality above all us. It is by tapping into this passion that we truly realise who we are, and why we are lucky to be alive.

Let the doubters succeeding doubting: let us try to be original, even if we are unlikely to succeed. It is nobler to fail trying to attain a lofty dream than to master mediocrity.

Wherever you are, whatever you are doing, however you were thinking – I ask you this: would it, or would it not, be improved if you were to do something truly original at this very moment? Even if you didn’t succeed, or fell flat on your face, you would still have accomplished something most never do: you will have tried to be original.

And that alone is admirable.

 II

But who knows? You might even succeed and make the transition from dreamer to achiever. If your aim is the simple goal of enjoying life, as I believe many people’s is, then I can assure you that striving for originality will result pleasures that are not chemical, orgasmic or short-lived – the path towards originality will open up to you a utopia, a world of pleasures which are truly meaningful and inspiration. Where you yourself are an inspiration to others.
Originality breeds respect.

III

There is no success without trying.