Behind every “ORIGINAL” idea is a smart remix of existing ones. Learn how to steal creatively and make your own unique mark.
There’s a famous quote by Pablo Picasso that goes: “Good artists copy. Great artists steal.”
At first glance, it sounds like Picasso is encouraging plagiarism. But dig deeper and you’ll realize he meant something far more profound. In any creative field, “stealing”, if done smartly, isn’t really stealing at all. It’s called recombination.
What Is Recombination?
Recombination means taking two or more existing ideas and combining them to create something new.
Think about the Wright brothers. We credit them for inventing the airplane, but the truth is their design was a smart combination of multiple technologies – bicycle mechanics, gliders, propellers, and the internal combustion engine.
Even the iPhone, one of the most iconic inventions of our time, is not an invention from scratch. It’s a clever recombination of hardware and software technologies that already existed.
The Myth of Originality
Words like original, authentic, and innovative are favorites in the creative world. We idolize creators who “think outside the box”, who make things the world has never seen before.
We call them geniuses and visionaries. But here’s the uncomfortable truth: True originality is a myth.
Everything we create, whether it’s a video, a photo, a script, or a book, is the result of everything we’ve seen, heard, felt, and experienced throughout our lives.
Our brain is essentially a giant remix machine. It constantly absorbs ideas from films, music, books, reels, YouTube videos, and yes, even memes.
So when we sit down to create something new, we don’t invent it out of thin air. We simply recombine what we’ve already consumed in a way that feels fresh.
That’s not copying. That’s creative recombination. And in the creative world, originality doesn’t mean creating from nothing. It means creating from everything.
Steve Jobs was deeply inspired by Picasso’s quote. In fact, Apple’s entire design philosophy was based on this very idea.
The iPhone didn’t invent mobile phones. The iPod didn’t invent MP3 players. But what Apple did was take multiple existing ideas and blend them so smartly that they created products which redefined entire industries.
This principle applies to editing, filmmaking, music, photography, writing, and every other creative field out there.
Even the memes you scroll through on Instagram are a form of recombination.
Take a movie scene. Add a funny caption. Layer a trending audio clip, and boom, you’ve got a viral meme.
That’s how modern creativity works.
You don’t have to invent something from scratch. You just need to collect good ideas, not just from your niche, but from everywhere: art, music, science, tech, literature, nature, and then, like a professional chef, use those ingredients to whip up your own creative recipes.
A Personal Example
I once read a self-help book where I came across something called Hofstadter’s Law. It says:
“It always takes longer than you expect, even when you take into account Hofstadter’s Law.”
That immediately sparked an idea in my head, What if I combined this concept with video editing? Could it help editors better estimate how long a project will actually take?
That one thought turned into a unique video. I took an idea completely unrelated to editing, mixed it with my expertise, and created something valuable and fresh.
That’s the power of recombination.
Lazy Copying vs. Creative Stealing
There’s a big difference between lazy copying and creative stealing. When you copy someone’s idea exactly as it is, without adding anything new, that’s lazy copying. That’s plagiarism.
But creative stealing means you:
- Respect the original creator.
- Respect the effort behind the idea.
- Respect yourself enough to add value to it and make it better.
There’s enough room in the creative world for everyone. But the ones who last the longest are those who know how to mix inspiration with integrity.
Smart stealing isn’t about cheating the system. It’s about understanding how it works and then playing it better.