Create Versus Consume – How are you spending your time?

Anyone who has spent time clicking on pins to add to their various Pinterest boards, sharing pictures on Facebook, or retweeting other people’s tweets may have had the following thought at some point. What is your create versus consume ratio? How much are you consuming, in terms of online content, for example, in comparison to how much you are creating?

Even if you do not participate in social media, perhaps you have questioned how much you read, compared to how much you write? If you are someone who has a blog, or a YouTube channel, have you wondered what your Create to Consume ratio is? Do you often feel like you could be doing more with your time than mindlessly consuming the work of others?

Now, I enjoy a good book as much as the next person, and I have a passion for documentaries and murder mysteries. But how do you go about creating a balance between your consumption and being creative?

The create versus consume ratio is something, I am sure that someone will have made a calculator for. It raises an interesting point, which, perhaps I should go lookup. This brings me to another point.

What are you creating?

Has Google made us less creative? Instead of figuring things out for ourselves, we turn to the Internet to look for other people who have laid a path, as it were and use their ideas.

I am very conscious of this, as I always used to be incredibly creative; give me some tissue paper, a toilet roll and some glitter and I was away! I am now more likely to type the ‘ingredients’ into a search engine and see what it suggests.

Pinterest is my go-to for crafty ideas, whereas in the past I would happily come up with ideas myself. The access to everyone else’s ideas has made me lazy and complacent; I don’t need to create when I can consume.

In fact, I didn’t even create this concept; The Minimalists mention it on their website. That doesn’t mean, however, that I can’t work with it, I just need to add value, so let’s look at how we currently do things, make a list of things we consume and how we can change our ratio.

Using Social Media

On an average day, I go on Twitter, Instagram, Pinterest and my blog. I read I write, I go to work, and I interact with my family (grunts from them in reply count as interaction).

In each of these areas – with perhaps the exception of my blog, and the guttural utterances of my teenagers- I am mainly receiving information; liking the work of others, commenting on others’ creativity, sharing other people’s posts, pictures and pins.

When do I create? In what areas can I make improvements? How can I change the balance?

Now that I am conscious of it, I am making more of an effort, so here are some suggestions to help you find a happy medium.

Instagram

Instead of just flicking through, liking everything or writing inane ‘great pic’ comments on people’s shots, craft a reply that will add value to the post. Remember to create some decent images of your own. You do not have to be an amazing photographer; you can use an app like Canva to create a graphic /text combo.

If you have a Bitmoji you don’t even need to appear in the images if you’d rather not – like this one below. This could also be a good way to get logos or brand colours out there. Try out different styles, experiment and see what seems to be resonating with people.

Twitter

There is an unofficial rule regarding twitter that you should retweet 3 things from other people for every self-written tweet. I can see why this would be useful; not only does it fill your feed and increase your reach, but it shows you to be a caring and helpful member of the Twitter community.

I have often seen feeds, that are littered with nonsense one-liners that give the impression that the tweeter is just screaming into a void, with very little interaction. Making useful comments on others’ posts – and then retweeting them is combining the best of creating and consuming; you are promoting others while providing additional content.

I will confess to no longer using Twitter as it has become a bit toxic for me. It’s a good idea to step away from any platform that is not serving you any longer.

Pinterest

This is an area where I am far more likely to share other people’s work than create my own. I am working on this though. There are many online courses that will teach you how to get the most out of the medium.

Again, much like Twitter, it pays to share the work of others. Pins can be as simple as photos you like, or images you have layered with text. Legend has it, that it is a great way to get traffic to your blog – so here are some I made earlier.

Everyday Life

What do you consume on an everyday basis? Take note and try to be more conscious of what you are doing. Are you reading the work of others? Or are you writing your own? Have you maybe considered starting a course? Could you possibly be producing your own?

Are you following a pattern? Or are you making one up for yourself?

No one can be expected to constantly innovate, some ideas are constantly reused because they are one of the best ways of doing things – the wheel is still going strong, for example!

However, if you become aware of the fact that you often turn to others for ideas, be that people, social media or search engines, then consider areas of your life where you can make opportunities to generate new things.

Ways to create

Have a go today, what will you create?